SPROUL-HALL 


MIDDLEMAECH. 


y/Ncy  AND    PETER   FEATHER- 

STONE.     J'hotogravure.     From  drawing  by  /f . 
L.  Taylor. 


The  Complete  Works 

of 

George  Eliot 


MIDDLEMARCH 

A   STUDY    OF   PROVINCIAL   LIFE 


VOLUME    I 


ILLUSTRATED 


NEW    YORK   AND    LONDON 

HARPER    Gf    BROTHERS 

PUBLISHERS 


TO 


GEORGE  HENRY  LEWES, 

DT   THIS   NINETEENTH   YEAR   OF    OUR 
BLESSED   UNION. 


SRLF 

f  v        PR 

«Wl 


CONTENTS. 


PAOK 

PRELUDE      1 

BOOK 

I.  Miss  BROOKE 3 

II.  OLD  AND  YOUNG 163 

III.  WAITING  TOR  DEATH 313 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

VOL.  I. 
FEED  VINEY  AND  PETER  FEATHERSTONE  (p.  151)  .    Frontispiece 

DOROTHEA Page     6 

MR.  CASAUBON  AND  DOROTHEA 64 

BASILICA  OF  ST.  PETER'S,  ROME 260 


PRELUDE. 


WHO  that  cares  much  to  know  the  history  of  man, 
and  how  the  mysterious  mixture  behaves  under  the 
varying  experiments  of  Time,  has  not  dwelt,  at 
least  briefly,  on  the  life  of  Saint  Theresa,  has  not 
smiled  with  some  gentleness  at  the  thought  of  the 
little  girl  walking  forth  one  morning  hand-in-hand 
with  her  still  smaller  brother,  to  go  and  seek 
martyrdom  in  the  country  of  the  Moors  ?  Out  they 
toddled  from  rugged  Avila,  wide-eyed  and  helpless- 
looking  as  two  fawns,  but  with  human  hearts, 
already  beating  to  a  national  idea;  until  domestic 
reality  met  them  in  the  shape  of  uncles,  and  turned 
them  back  from  their  great  resolve.  That  child- 
pilgrimage  was  a  fit  beginning.  Theresa's  passion- 
ate, ideal  nature  demanded  an  epic  life  :  what  were 
many-volumed  romances  of  chivalry  and  the  social 
conquests  of  a  brilliant  girl  to  her?  Her  flame 
quickly  burned  up  that  light  fuel ;  and,  fed  from 
within,  soared  after  some  illimitable  satisfaction, 
some  object  which  would  never  justify  weariness, 
which  would  reconcile  self-despair  with  the  raptu- 
rous consciousness  of  life  beyond  self.  She  found 
her  epos  in  the  reform  of  a  religious  order. 

That  Spanish  woman  who  lived  three  hundred 
years  ago,  was  certainly  not  the  last  of  her  kind. 
Many  Theresas  have  been  born  who  found  for 
themselves  no  epic  life  wherein  there  was  a  con- 

VOL.  I.  —  1 


2  MIDDLEMARCH. 

stant  unfolding  of  far-resonant  action ;  perhaps 
only  a  life  of  mistakes,  the  offspring  of  a  certain 
spiritual  grandeur  ill-matched  with  the  meanness 
of  opportunity;  perhaps  a  tragic  failure  which 
found  no  sacred  poet  and  sank  unwept  into  ob- 
livion. With  dim  lights  and  tangled  circumstance 
they  tried  to  shape  their  thought  and  deed  in  noble 
agreement;  but  after  all,  to  common  eyes  their 
struggles  seemed  mere  inconsistency  and  formless- 
ness ;  for  these  later-born  Theresas  were  helped  by 
no  coherent  social  faith  and  order  which  could 
perform  the  function  of  knowledge  for  the  ardently 
willing  soul.  Their  ardour  alternated  between  a 
vague  ideal  and  the  common  yearning  of  woman- 
hood ;  so  that  the  one  was  disapproved  as  extrava- 
gance, and  the  other  condemned  as  a  lapse. 

Some  have  felt  that  these  blundering  lives  are 
due  to  the  inconvenient  indefiniteness  with  which 
the  Supreme  Power  has  fashioned  the  natures  of 
women  :  if  there  were  one  level  of  feminine  incom- 
petence as  strict  as  the  ability  to  count  three  and 
no  more,  the  social  lot  of  women  might  be  treated 
with  scientific  certitude.  Meanwhile  the  indefi- 
niteness remains,  and  the  limits  of  variation  are 
really  much  wider  than  any  one  would  imagine 
from  the  sameness  of  women's  coiffure  and  the 
favourite  love-stories  in  prose  and  verse.  Here 
and  there  a  cygnet  is  reared  uneasily  among  the 
ducklings  in  the  brown  pond,  and  never  finds  the 
living  stream  in  fellowship  with  its  own  oary- 
footed  kind.  Here  and  there  is  born  a  Saint 
Theresa,  foundress  of  nothing,  whose  loving  heart- 
beats and  sobs  after  an  unattained  goodness  tremble 
off  and  are  dispersed  among  hindrances,  instead  of 
centring  in  some  long-recognizable  deed. 


MIDDLEMAECH. 


BOOK  I. 

MISS  BEOOKE. 
CHAPTER  I. 

Since  I  can  do  no  good  because  a  woman, 
Beach  constantly  at  something  that  is  near  it. 

The  Maid's  Tragedy  :  BEAUMONT  AND  FLETCHEB 

Miss  BROOKE  had  that  kind  of  beauty  which  seems 
to  be  thrown  into  relief  by  poor  dress.  Her  hand 
and  wrist  were  so  finely  formed  that  she  could  weaj 
sleeves  not  less  bare  of  style  than  those  in  whiclf 
the  Blessed  Virgin  appeared  to  Italian  pa  inters  v 
and  her  profile  as  well  as  her  stature  and  bearing, 
seemed  to  gain  the  more  dignity  from  her  plain 
garments,  which  by  the  side  of  provincial  fashion 
gave  her  the  impressiveness  of  a  fine  quotation 
from  the  Bible  —  or  from  one  of  our  elder  poets  — 
in  a  paragraph  of  to-day's  newspaper.  She  was 
usually  spoken  of  as  being  remarkably  clever,  but 
with  the  addition  that  her  sister  Celia  had  more 
common-sense.  Nevertheless,  Celia  wore  scarcely 
more  trimmings ;  and  it  was  only  to  close  obser- 
vers that  her  dress  differed  from  her  sister '&,  and 


4  MIDDLEMARCH. 

had  a  shade  of  coquetry  in  its  arrangements ;  for 
Miss  Brooke's  plain  dressing  was  due  to  mixed 
conditions,  in  most  of  which  her  sister  shared. 
The  pride  of  being  ladies  had  something  to  do  with 
it:  the  Brooke  connections,  though  not  exactly 
aristocratic,  were  unquestionably  "  good :  "  if  you 
inquired  backward  for  a  generation  or  two,  you 
would  not  find  any  yard-measuring  or  parcel-tying 
forefathers,  —  anything  lower  than  an  admiral  or  a 
clergyman  ;  and  there  was  even  an  ancestor  dis- 
cernible as  a  Puritan  gentleman  who  served  under 
Cromwell,  but  afterwards  conformed,  and  managed 
to  come  out  of  all  political  troubles  as  the  proprie- 
tor of  a  respectable  family  estate.  Young  women 
of  such  birth,  living  in  a  quiet  country-house, 
and  attending  a  village  church  hardly  larger  than 
a  parlour,  naturally  regarded  frippery  as  the  am- 
bition of  a  huckster's  daughter.  Then  there  was 
well-bred  economy,  which  in  those  days  made 
show  in  dress  the  first  item  to  be  deducted  from 
when  any  margin  was  required  for  expenses  more 
distinctive  of  rank.  Such  reasons  would  have  been 
enough  to  account  for  plain  dress,  quite  apart  from 
religious  feeling;  but  in  Miss  Brooke's  case  reli- 
gion alone  would  have  determined  it ;  and  Celia 
mildly  acquiesced  in  all  her  sister's  sentiments, 
only  infusing  them  with  that  common-sense  which 
is  able  to  accept  momentous  doctrines  without  any 
eccentric  agitation.  Dorothea  knew  many  passages 
of  Pascal's  Pense.es  and  of  Jeremy  Taylor  by  heart; 
and  to  her  the  destinies  of  mankind,  seen  by  the 
light  of  Christianity,  made  the  solicitudes  of  femi- 
nine fashion  appear  an  occupation  for  Bedlam. 
She  could  not  reconcile  the  anxieties  of  a  spiritual 
life  involving  eternal  consequences,  with  a  keen 


HISS  BROOKE.  5 

interest  in  gimp  and  artificial  protrusions  of  dra- 
pery. Her  mind  was  theoretic,  and  yearned  by 
its  nature  after  some  lofty  conception  of  the  world 
which  might  frankly  include  the  parish  of  Tipton 
and  her  own  rule  of  conduct  there ;  she  was  en- 
amoured of  intensity  and  greatness,  and  rash  in 
embracing  whatever  seemed  to  her  to  have  those 
aspects ;  likely  to  seek  martyrdom,  to  make  retrac- 
tations, and  then  to  incur  martyrdom  after  all  in 
a  quarter  where  she  had  not  sought  it.  Certainly 
such  elements  in  the  character  of  a  marriageable 
girl  tended  to  interfere  with  her  lot,  and  hinder  it 
from  being  decided  according  to  custom,  by  good 
looks,  vanity,  and  merely  canine  affection.  With 
all  this,  she,  the  elder  of  the  sisters,  was  not  yet 
twenty,  and  they  had  both  been  educated,  since 
they  were  about  twelve  years  old  and  had  lost 
their  parents,  on  plans  at  once  narrow  and  promis- 
cuous, first  in  an  English  family  and  afterwards  in 
a  Swiss  family  at  Lausanne,  their  bachelor  uncle 
and  guardian  trying  in  this  way  to  remedy  the 
disadvantages  of  their  orphaned  condition. 

It  was  hardly  a  year  since  they  had  come  to  live 
at  Tipton  Grange  with  their  uncle,  a  man  nearly 
sixty,  of  acquiescent  temper,  miscellaneous  opin- 
ions, and  uncertain  vote.  He  had  travelled  in  his 
younger  years,  and  was  held  in  this  part  of  the 
county  to  have  contracted  a  too  rambling  habit  of 
mind.  Mr.  Brooke's  conclusions  were  as  difficult 
to  predict  as  the  weather :  it  was  only  safe  to  say 
that  he  would  act  with  benevolent  intentions,  and 
that  he  would  spend  as  little  money  as  possible  in 
carrying  them  out.  For  the  most  glutinously  in- 
definite minds  enclose  some  hard  grains  of  habit; 
and  a  man  has  been  seen  lax  about  all  his  own 


6  MIDDLEMARCH. 

interests  except  the  retention  of  his  snuff-box,  con- 
cerning which  he  was  watchful,  suspicious,  and 
greedy  of  clutch. 

In  Mr.  Brooke  the  hereditary  strain  of  Puritan 
energy  was  clearly  in  abeyance ;  but  in  his  niece 
Dorothea  it  glowed  alike  through  faults  and  vir- 
tues, turning  sometimes  into  impatience  of  her 
uncle's  talk  or  his  way  of  "  letting  things  be  "  on 
his  estate,  and  making  her  long  all  the  more  for 
the  time  when  she  would  be  of  age  and  have  some 
command  of  money  for  generous  schemes.  She 
was  regarded  as  an  heiress ;  for  not  only  had  the 
sisters  seven  hundred  a  year  each  from  their  par- 
ents, but  if  Dorothea  married  and  had  a  son,  that 
son  would  inherit  Mr.  Brooke's  estate,  presumably 
worth  about  three  thousand  a  year,  —  a  rental  which 
seemed  wealth  to  provincial  families,  still  discuss- 
ing Mr.  Peel's  late  conduct  on  the  Catholic  ques- 
tion, innocent  of  future  gold-fields,  and  of  that 
gorgeous  plutocracy  which  has  so  nobly  exalted 
the  necessities  of  genteel  life. 

And  how  should  Dorothea  not  marry  ?  —  a  girl 
so  handsome  and  with  such  prospects  ?  Nothing 
could  hinder  it  but  her  love  of  extremes,  and  her 
insistence  on  regulating  life  according  to  notions 
which  might  cause  a  wary  man  to  hesitate  before 
he  made  her  an  offer,  or  even  might  lead  her  at 
last  to  refuse  all  offers.  A  young  lady  of  some 
birth  and  fortune,  who  knelt  suddenly  down  on  a 
brick  floor  by  the  side  of  a  sick  labourer  and  prayed 
fervidly  as  if  she  thought  herself  living  in  the 
time  of  the  Apostles,  — who  had  strange  whims  of 
fasting  like  a  Papist,  and  of  sitting  up  at  night  to 
read  old  theological  books !  Such  a  wife  might 
awaken  you  some  fine  morning  with  a  new  scheme 


DOROTHEA.. 


MISS  BROOKE.  7 

for  the  application  of  her  income  which  would 
interfere  with  political  economy  and  the  keeping 
of  saddle-horses :  a  man  would  naturally  think 
twice  before  he  risked  himself  in  such  fellowship. 
Women  were  expected  to  have  weak  opinions ;  but 
the  great  safeguard  of  society  and  of  domestic  life 
was,  that  opinions  were  not  acted  on.  Sane  people 
did  what  their  neighbours  did,  so  that  if  any  luna- 
tics were  at  large,  one  might  know  and  avoid  them. 

The  rural  opinion  about  the  new  young  ladies, 
even  among  the  cottagers,  was  generally  in  favqur 
of  Celia,  as  being  so  amiable  and  innocent-looking, 
while  Miss  Brooke's  large  eyes  seemed,  like  her 
religion,  too  unusual  and  striking.  Poor  Doro- 
thea! compared  with  her,  the  innocent-looking 
Celia  was  knowing  and  worldly-wise;  so  much 
subtler  is  a  human  mind  than  the  outside  tissues 
which  make  a  sort  of  blazonry  or  clock-face  for  it. 

Yet  those  who  approached  Dorothea,  though 
prejudiced  against  her  by  this  alarming  hearsay, 
found  that  she  had  a  charm  unaccountably  recon- 
cilable with  it.  Most  men  thought  her  bewitching 
when  she  was  on  horseback.  She  loved  the  fresh 
air  and  the  various  aspects  of  the  country,  and 
when  her  eyes  and  cheeks  glowed  with  mingled 
pleasure  she  looked  very  little  like  a  devotee. 
Biding  was  an  indulgence  which  she  allowed  her- 
self in  spite  of  conscientious  qualms ;  she  felt  that 
she  enjoyed  it  in  a  pagan  sensuous  way,  and  al- 
ways looked  forward  to  renouncing  it 

She  was  open,  ardent,  and  not  in  the  least  self- 
admiring;  indeed,  it  was  pretty  to  see  how  her 
imagination  adorned  her  sister  Celia  with  attrac- 
tions altogether  superior  to  her  own,  and  if  any 
gentleman  appeared  to  come  to  the  Grange  from 


8  MIDDLEMARCH. 

some  other  motive  than  that  of  seeing  Mr.  Brooke, 
she  concluded  that  he  must  be  in  love  with  Celia: 
Sir  James  Chettam,  for  example,  whom  she  con- 
stantly considered  from  Celia 's  point  of  view,  in- 
wardly debating  whether  it  would  be  good  for 
Celia  to  accept  him.  That  he  should  be  regarded 
as  a  suitor  to  herself  would  have  seemed  to  her 
a  ridiculous  irrelevance.  Dorothea,  with  all  her 
eagerness  to  know  the  truths  of  life,  retained 
very  childlike  ideas  about  marriage.  She  felt  sure 
that  she  would  have  accepted  the  judicious  Hooker, 
if  she  had  been  born  in  time  to  save  him  from  that 
wretched  mistake  he  made  in  matrimony ;  or  John 
Milton  when  his  blindness  had  come  on ;  or  any 
of  the  other  great  men  whose  odd  habits  it  would 
have  been  glorious  piety  to  endure ;  but  an  amia- 
ble handsome  baronet,  who  said  "  Exactly  "  to  her 
remarks  even  when  she  expressed  uncertainty,  — 
how  could  he  affect  her  as  a  lover?  The  really 
delightful  marriage  must  be  that  where  your  hus- 
band was  a  sort  of  father,  and  could  teach  you 
even  Hebrew,  if  you  wished  it. 

These  peculiarities  of  Dorothea's  character  caused 
Mr.  Brooke  to  be  all  the  more  blamed  in  neigh- 
bouring families  for  not  securing  some  middle-aged 
lady  as  guide  and  companion  to  his  nieces.  But 
he  himself  dreaded  so  much  the  sort  of  superior 
woman  likely  to  be  available  for  such  a  position, 
that  he  allowed  himself  to  be  dissuaded  by  Doro- 
thea's objections,  and  was  in  this  case  brave  enough 
to  defy  the  world, — that  is  to  say,  Mrs.  Cadwalla- 
der  the  Rector's  wife,  and  the  small  group  of 
gentry  with  whom  he  visited  in  the  northeast 
corner  of  Loamshire.  So  Miss  Brooke  presided  in 
her  uncle's  household,  and  did  not  at  all  dislike 


MISS  BROOKE.  9 

her  new  authority,  with  the  homage  that  belonged 
to  it. 

Sir  James  Chettam  was  going  to  dine  at  the 
Grange  to-day  with  another  gentleman  whom  the 
girls  had  never  seen,  and  about  whom  Dorothea 

o 

felt  some  venerating  expectation.  This  was  the 
Eeverend  Edward  Casaubon,  noted  in  the  county 
as  a  man  of  profound  learning,  understood  for  many 
years  to  be  engaged  on  a  great  work  concerning 
religious  history ;  also  as  a  man  of  wealth  enough 
to  give  lustre  to  his  piety,  and  having  views 
of  his  own  which  were  to  be  more  clearly  ascer- 
tained on  the  publication  of  his  book.  His  very 
name  carried  an  impressiveness  hardly  to  be  meas- 
ured without  a  precise  chronology  of  scholarship. 

Early  in  the  day  Dorothea  had  returned  from 
the  infant  school  which  she  had  set  going  in  the 
village,  and  was  taking  her  usual  place  in  the 
pretty  sitting-room  which  divided  the  bedrooms 
of  the  sisters,  bent  on  finishing  a  plan  for  some 
buildings  (a  kind  of  work  which  she  delighted  in), 
when  Celia,  who  had  been  watching  her  with  a 
hesitating  desire  to  propose  something,  said,  — 

"  Dorothea  dear,  if  you  don't  mind, —  if  you  are 
not  very  busy,  —  suppose  we  looked  at  mamma's 
jewels  to-day,  and  divided  them  ?  It  is  exactly 
six  months  to-day  since  uncle  gave  them  to  you, 
and  you  have  not  looked  at  them  yet. " 

Celia 's  face  had  the  shadow  of  a  pouting  expres- 
sion in  it,  the  full  presence  of  the  pout  being  kept 
back  by  an  habitual  awe  of  Dorothea  and  prin- 
ciple, —  two  associated  facts  which  might  show  a 
mysterious  electricity  if  you  touched  them  incau- 
tiously. To  her  relief,  Dorothea's  eyes  were  full 
of  laughter  as  she  looked  up. 


io  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  What  a  wonderful  little  almanac  you  are, 
Celia !  Is  it  six  calendar  or  six  lunar  months  ?  " 

"  It  is  the  last  day  of  September  now,  and  it  was 
the  first  of  April  when  uncle  gave  them  to  you. 
You  know,  he  said  that  he  had  forgotten  them  till 
then.  I  believe  you  have  never  thought  of  them 
since  you  locked  them  up  in  the  cabinet  here. " 

"  Well,  dear,  we  should  never  wear  them,  you 
know. "  Dorothea  spoke  in  a  full  cordial  tone, 
half  caressing,  half  explanatory.  She  had  her 
pencil  in  her  hand,  and  was  making  tiny  side- 
plans  on  a  margin. 

Celia  coloured,  and  looked  very  grave.  "  I 
think,  dear,  we  are  wanting  in  respect  to  mamma's 
memory,  to  put  them  by  and  take  no  notice  of 
them.  And, "  she  added,  after  hesitating  a  little, 
with  a  rising  sob  of  mortification,  "  necklaces  are 
quite  usual  now ;  and  Madame  Poin^on,  who  was 
stricter  in  some  things  even  than  you  are,  used 
to  wear  ornaments.  And  Christians  generally  — 
surely  there  are  women  in  heaven  now  who  wore 
jewels. "  Celia  was  conscious  of  some  mental 
strength  when  she  really  applied  herself  to 
argument. 

"  You  would  like  to  wear  them  ? "  exclaimed 
Dorothea,  an  air  of  astonished  discovery  animating 
her  whole  person  with  a  dramatic  action  which 
she  had  caught  from  that  very  Madame  PoinQon 
who  wore  the  ornaments.  "  Of  course,  then,  let 
us  have  them  out.  Why  did  you  not  tell  me  be- 
fore ?  But  the  keys,  the  keys !  "  She -pressed  her 
hands  against  the  sides  of  her  head,  and  seemed  to 
despair  of  her  memory. 

"  They  are  here,"  said  Celia,  with  whom  this  ex- 
planation had  been  long  meditated  and  prearranged. 


MISS  BROOKE.  II 

"  Pray  open  the  large  drawer  of  the  cabinet  and 
get  out  the  jewel-box. " 

The  casket  was  soon  open  before  them,  and  the 
various  jewels  spread  out,  making  a  bright  parterre 
on  the  table.  It  was  no  great  collection,  but  a 
few  of  the  ornaments  were  really  of  remarkable 
beauty,  the  finest  that  was  obvious  at  first  being  a 
necklace  of  purple  amethysts  set  in  exquisite  gold 
work,  and  a  pearl  cross  with  five  brilliants  in  it. 
Dorothea  immediately  took  up  the  necklace  and 
fastened  it  round  her  sister's  neck,  where  it  fitted 
almost  as  closely  as  a  bracelet;  but  the  circle 
suited  the  Henrietta-Maria  style  of  Celia's  head 
and  neck,  and  she  could  see  that  it  did,  in  the 
pier-glass  opposite. 

"  There,  Celia !  you  can  wear  that  with  your 
Indian  muslin.  But  this  cross  you  must  wear 
with  your  dark  dresses. " 

Celia  was  trying  not  to  smile  with  pleasure.  "  Oh, 
Dodo,  you  must  keep  the  cross  yourself.  " 

"  No,  no,  dear,  no, "  said  Dorothea,  putting  up 
her  hand  with  careless  deprecation. 

"  Yes,  indeed  you  must ;  it  would  suit  you,  —  in 
your  black  dress,  now, "  said  Celia,  insistingly. 
"  You  might  wear  that.  " 

"  Not  for  the  world,  not  for  the  world.  A  cross 
is  the  last  thing  I  would  wear  as  a  trinket. " 
Dorothea  shuddered  slightly. 

"  Then  you  will  think  it  wicked  in  me  to  wear 
it, "  said  Celia,  uneasily. 

"  No,  dear,  no, "  said  Dorothea,  stroking  her 
sister's  cheek.  "Souls  have  complexions  too: 
what  will  suit  one  will  not  suit  another. " 

"  But  you  might  like  to  keep  it  for  mamma's 
saka  " 


12  MIDDLEM  ARGIL 

"No,  I  have  other  things  of  mamma's, — her 
sandal-wood  box  which  I  am  so  fond  of,  —  plenty 
of  things.  In  fact,  they  are  all  yours,  dear.  We 
need  discuss  them  no  longer.  There,  —  take  away 
your  property.  " 

Celia  felt  a  little  hurt.  There  was  a  strong 
assumption  of  superiority  in  this  Puritanic  tolera- 
tion, hardly  less  trying  to  the  blond  flesh  of  an 
unenthusiastic  sister  than  a  Puritanic  persecution. 

"  But  how  can  I  wear  ornaments  if  you,  who  are 
the  elder  sister,  will  never  wear  them  ? " 

"  Nay,  Celia,  that  is  too  much  to  ask,  that  I 
should  wear  trinkets  to  keep  you  in  countenance. 
If  I  were  to  put  on  such  a  necklace  as  that,  I 
should  feel  as  if  I  had  been  pirouetting.  The 
world  would  go  round  with  me,  and  I  should  not 
know  how  to  walk. " 

Celia  had  unclasped  the  necklace  and  drawn  it 
off.  "  It  would  be  a  little  tight  for  your  neck ; 
something  to  lie  down  and  hang  would  suit  you 
better, "  she  said,  with  some  satisfaction.  The 
complete  unfitness  of  the  necklace  from  all  points 
of  view  for  Dorothea,  made  Celia  happier  in  tak- 
ing it.  She  was  opening  some  ring-boxes,  which 
disclosed  a  fine  emerald  with  diamonds,  and  just 
then  the  sun  passing  beyond  a  cloud  sent  a  bright 
gleam  over  the  table. 

"How  very  beautiful  these  gems  are!"  said 
Dorothea,  under  a  new  current  of  feeling,  as  sud- 
den as  the  gleam.  "  It  is  strange  how  deeply 
colours  seem  to  penetrate  one,  like  scent.  I  sup- 
pose that  is  the  reason  why  gems  are  used  as 
spiritual  emblems  in  the  Eevelation  of  Saint  John. 
They  look  like  fragments  of  heaven.  I  think  that 
emerald  is  more  beautiful  than  any  of  them. " 


MISS  BROOKE.  13 

"And  there  is  a  bracelet  to  match  it,"  said 
Celia.  "  We  did  not  notice  this  at  first. " 

"  They  are  lovely, "  said  Dorothea,  slipping  the 
ring  and  bracelet  on  her  finely  turned  finger  and 
wrist,  and  holding  them  towards  the  window  on  a 
level  with  her  eyes.  All  the  while  her  thought 
was  trying  to  justify  her  delight  in  the  colours  by 
merging  them  in  her  mystic  religious  joy. 

"  You  would  like  those,  Dorothea, "  said  Celia, 
rather  falteringly,  beginning  to  think  with  won- 
der that  her  sister  showed  some  weakness,  and 
also  that  emeralds  would  suit  her  own  complexion 
even  better  than  purple  amethysts.  "  You  must 
keep  that  ring  and  bracelet,  —  if  nothing  else. 
But  see,  these  agates  are  very  pretty  —  and  quiet.  " 

"  Yes !  I  will  keep  these,  —  this  ring  and  brace- 
let, "  said  Dorothea.  Then,  letting  her  hand  fall 
on  the  table,  she  said  in  another  tone,  "  Yet  what 
miserable  men  find  such  things,  and  work  at  them, 
and  sell  them ! "  She  paused  again,  and  Celia 
thought  that  her  sister  was  going  to  renounce  the 
ornaments,  as  in  consistency  she  ought  to  do. 

"  Yes,  dear,  I  will  keep  these, "  said  Dorothea, 
decidedly.  "  But  take  all  the  rest  away,  and  the 
casket. " 

She  took  up  her  pencil  without  removing  the 
jewels,  and  still  looking  at  them.  She  thought  of 
often  having  them  by  her,  to  feed  her  eye  at  these 
little  fountains  of  pure  colour. 

"  Shall  you  wear  them  in  company  ?  "  said  Celia, 
who  was  watching  her  with  real  curiosity  as  to 
what  she  would  do. 

Dorothea  glanced  quickly  at  her  sister.  Across 
all  her  imaginative  adornment  of  those  whom  she 
loved,  there  darted  now  and  then  a  keen  discern- 


14  MIDDLEMARCH. 

inent,  which  was  not  without  a  scorching  quality. 
If  Miss  Brooke  ever  attained  perfect  meekness,  it 
would  not  be  for  lack  of  inward  fire. 

"  Perhaps, "  she  said,  rather  haughtily.  "  I  can- 
not tell  to  what  level  I  may  sink. " 

Celia  blushed,  and  was  unhappy:  she  saw  that 
she  had  offended  her  sister,  and  dared  not  say  even 
anything  pretty  about  the  gift  of  the  ornaments 
which  she  put  back  into  the  box  and  carried  away. 
Dorothea  too  was  unhappy,  as  she  went  on  with 
her  plan -drawing,  questioning  the  purity  of  her 
own  feeling  and  speech  in  the  scene  which  had 
ended  with  that  little  explosion. 

Celia's  consciousness  told  her  that  she  had  not 
been  at  all  in  the  wrong :  it  was  quite  natural  and 
justifiable  that  she  should  have  asked  that  ques- 
tion, and  she  repeated  to  herself  that  Dorothea 
was  inconsistent :  either  she  should  have  taken 
her  full  share  of  the  jewels,  or,  after  what  she  had 
said,  she  should  have  renounced  them  altogether. 

"  I  am  sure,  —  at  least,  I  trust, "  thought  Celia, 
"  that  the  wearing  of  a  necklace  will  not  interfere 
with  my  prayers.  And  I  do  not  see  that  I  should 
be  bound  by  Dorothea's  opinions  now  we  are  going 
into  society,  though  of  course  she  herself  ought  to 
be  bound  by  them.  But  Dorothea  is  not  always 
consistent. " 

Thus  Celia,  mutely  bending  over  her  tapestry, 
until  she  heard  her  sister  calling  her. 

"  Here,  Kitty,  come  and  look  at  my  plan ;  I 
shall  think  I  am  a  great  architect,  if  I  have  not 
got  incompatible  stairs  and  fireplaces. " 

As  Celia  bent  over  the  paper,  Dorothea  put  her 
cheek  against  her  sister's  arm  caressingly.  Celia 
understood  the  action.  Dorothea  saw  that  she  had 


MISS  BROOKE.  i« 

been  in  the  wrong,  and  Celia  pardoned  her.  Since 
they  could  remember,  there  had  been  a  mixture  of 
criticism  and  awe  in  the  attitude  of  Celia 's  mind 
towards  her  elder  sister.  The  younger  had  always 
worn  a  yoke  ;  but  is  there  any  yoked  creature  with- 
out its  private  opinions? 


CHAPTER   II. 

"  Dime ;  no  ves  aquel  caballero  quo  hacia  nosotros  viene  sobre 
nn  caballo  rucio  rodado  que  trae  puesto  en  la  cabeza  un  yelmo  de 
oro  ?  "  "  Lo  que  veo  y  columbro,"  respondib  Sancho,  "  no  es  sino 
uu  hoiubre  sobre  un  as  no  pardo  como  el  mio,  que  trae  sobre  la 
cabeza  una  cosa  que  relumbra."  "  Pues  ese  es  el  yelmo  de  Mam- 
brino,"  dijo  Don  Quijote. 

("  Seest  thou  not  yon  cavalier  who  cometh  toward  us  on  a  dapple- 
gray  steed,  and  weareth  a  golden  helmet  ?  "  "  What  I  see," 
answered  Sancho,  "  is  nothing  but  a  man  on  a  gray  ass  like  my 
own,  who  carries  something  shiny  on  his  head."  "  Just  so," 
answered  Don  Quixote :  "  and  that  resplendent  object  is  the  hel- 
met of  Mambrino.")  —  CEKVANTES. 

"  SIR  HUMPHRY  DAVY  ?  "  said  Mr.  Brooke,  over  the 
soup,  in  his  easy  smiling  way,  taking  up  Sir  James 
Chettam's  remark  that  he  was  studying  Davy's 
Agricultural  Chemistry.  "  Well,  now,  Sir  Hum- 
phry Davy ;  I  dined  with  him  years  ago  at  Cart- 
wright's,  and  Wordsworth  was  there  too, — the 
poet  Wordsworth,  you  know.  Now  there  was 
something  singular.  I  was  at  Cambridge  when 
Wordsworth  was  there,  and  I  never  met  him,  — 
and  I  dined  with  him  twenty  years  afterwards  at 
Cartwright's.  There  's  an  oddity  in  things,  now. 
But  Davy  was  there :  he  was  a  poet  too.  Or,  as  I 
may  say,  Wordsworth  was  poet  one,  and  Davy  was 
poet  two.  That  was  true  in  every  sense,  you 
know. " 

Dorothea  felt  a  little  more  uneasy  than  usual. 
In  the  beginning  of  dinner,  the  party  being  small 
and  the  room  still,  these  motes  from  the  mass  of  a 


MISS   BROOKE.  17 

magistrate's  mind  fell  too  noticeably.  She  won- 
dered how  a  man  like  Mr.  Casaubon  would  support 
such  triviality.  His  manners,  she  thought,  were 
very  dignified  ;  the  set  of  his  iron-gray  hair  and  his 
deep  eye-sockets  made  him  resemble  the  portrait 
of  Locke.  He  had  the  spare  form  and  the  pale 
complexion  which  became  a  student;  as  different 
as  possible  from  the  blooming  Englishman  of  the 
red-whiskered  type  represented  by  Sir  James 
Chettam. 

"  I  am  reading  the  Agricultural  Chemistry, "  said 
this  excellent  baronet,  "  because  I  am  going  to 
take  one  of  the  farms  into  my  own  hands,  and  see 
if  something  cannot  be  done  in  setting  a  good  pat- 
tern of  farming  among  my  tenants.  Do  you  ap- 
prove of  that,  Miss  Brooke  ?  " 

"  A  great  mistake,  Chettam, "  interposed  Mr. 
Brooke,  "  going  into  electrifying  your  land  and 
that  kind  of  thing,  and  making  a  parlour  of  your 
cow-house.  It  won't  do.  I  went  into  science  a 
great  deal  myself  at  one  time ;  but  I  saw  it  would 
not  do.  It  leads  to  everything ;  you  can  let  noth- 
ing alone.  No,  no,  —  see  that  your  tenants  don't 
sell  their  straw,  and  that  kind  of  thing ;  and  give 
them  draining-tiles,  you  know.  But  your  fancy 
farming  will  not  do,  —  the  most  expensive  sort  of 
whistle  you  can  buy  :  you  may  as  well  keep  a  pack 
of  hounds. " 

"  Surely, "  said  Dorothea,  "  it  is  better  to  spend 
money  in  finding  out  how  men  can  make  the  most 
of  the  land  which  supports  them  all,  than  in  keep- 
ing dogs  and  horses  only  to  gallop  over  it.  It  is 
not  a  sin  to  make  yourself  poor  in  performing  ex- 
periments for  the  good  of  all.  " 

She  spoke  with  more  energy  than  is  expected  of 

VOL.  I.  — 2 


i8  MIDDLEMARCH. 

so  young  a  lady,  but  Sir  James  had  appealed  to 
her.  He  was  accustomed  to  do  so,  and  she  had 
often  thought  that  she  could  urge  him  to  many 
good  actions  when  he  was  her  brother-in-law. 

Mr.  Casaubon  turned  his  eyes  very  markedly  on 
Dorothea  while  she  was  speaking,  and  seemed  to 
observe  her  newly. 

"  Young  ladies  don't  understand  political  econ- 
omy, you  know, "  said  Mr.  Brooke,  smiling  towards 
Mr.  Casaubon.  "  I  remember  when  we  were  all 
reading  Adam  Smith.  There  is  a  book,  now.  I 
took  in  all  the  new  ideas  at  one  time,  —  human 
perfectibility,  now.  But  some  say,  history  moves 
in  circles ;  and  that  may  be  very  well  argued ;  I 
have  argued  it  myself.  The  fact  is,  human  reason 
may  carry  you  a  little  too  far, —  over  the  hedge,  in 
fact.  It  carried  me  a  good  way  at  one  time ;  but  I 
saw  it  would  not  do.  I  pulled  up ;  I  pulled  up  in 
time.  But  not  too  hard.  I  have  always  been  in 
favour  of  a  little  theory  :  we  must  have  Thought ; 
else  we  shall  be  landed  back  in  the  dark  ages. 
But  talking  of  books,  there  is  Southey's  '  Penin- 
sular War.'  I  am  reading  that  of  a  morning. 
You  know  Southey  ?  " 

"  No, "  said  Mr.  Casaubon,  not  keeping  pace 
with  Mr.  Brooke's  impetuous  reason,  and  thinking 
of  the  book  only.  "  I  have  little  leisure  for  such 
literature  just  now.  I  have  been  using  up  my 
eyesight  on  old  characters  lately;  the  fact  is,  I 
•want  a  reader  for  my  evenings ;  but  I  am  fastidi- 
ous in  voices,  and  I  cannot  endure  listening  to  an 
imperfect  reader.  It  is  a  misfortune,  in  some 
senses :  I  feed  too  much  on  the  inward  sources ;  I 
live  too  much  with  the  dead.  My  mind  is  some- 
thing like  the  ghost  of  an  ancient,  wandering  about 


MISS  BROOKE.  19 

the  world  and  trying  mentally  to  construct  it  as  it 
used  to  be,  in  spite  of  ruin  and  confusing  changes. 
But  I  find  it  necessary  to  use  the  utmost  caution 
about  my  eyesight " 

This  was  the  first  time  that  Mr.  Casaubon  had 
spoken  at  any  length.  He  delivered  himself  with 
precision,  as  if  he  had  been  called  upon  to  make  a 
public  statement ;  and  the  balanced  sing-song  neat- 
ness of  his  speech,  occasionally  corresponded  to  by 
a  movement  of  his  head,  was  the  more  conspicuous 
from  its  contrast  with  good  Mr.  Brooke's  scrappy 
slovenliness.  Dorothea  said  to  herself  that  Mr. 
Casaubon  was  the  most  interesting  man  she  had 
ever  seen*,  not  excepting  even  Monsieur  Liret,  the 
Vaudois  clergyman  who  had  given  conferences  on 
the  history  of  the  Waldenses.  To  reconstruct  a 
past  world,  doubtless  with  a  view  to  the  highest 
purposes  of  truth, —  what  a  work  to  be  in  any  way 
present  at,  to  assist  in,  though  only  as  a  lamp- 
holder  !  This  elevating  thought  lifted  her  above 
her  annoyance  at  being  twitted  with  her  ignorance 
of  political  economy,  that  never-explained  science 
which  was  thrust  as  an  extinguisher  over  all  her 
lights. 

"  But  you  are  fond  of  riding,  Miss  Brooke, "  Sir 
James  presently  took  an  opportunity  of  saying. 
"  I  should  have  thought  you  would  enter  a  little 
into  the  pleasures  of  hunting.  I  wish  you  would 
let  me  send  over  a  chestnut  horse  for  you  to  try. 
It  has  been  trained  for  a  lady.  I  saw  you  on 
Saturday  cantering  over  the  hill  on  a  nag  not 
worthy  of  you.  My  groom  shall  bring  Corydon 
for  you  every,  day,  if  you  will  only  mention  the 
time. " 

"  Thank  you,   you  are  very  good.     I   mean  tq 


20  MIDDLEMARCH. 

give  up  riding.  I  shall  not  ride  any  more, "  said 
Dorothea,  urged  to  this  brusque  resolution  by  a 
little  annoyance  that  Sir  James  would  be  soliciting 
her  attention  when  she  wanted  to  give  it  all  to 
Mr.  Casaubon. 

"  No,  that  is  too  hard, "  said  Sir  James,  in  a 
tone  of  reproach  that  showed  strong  interest. 
"  Your  sister  is  given  to  self-mortification,  is  she 
not  ? "  he  continued,  turning  to  Celia,  who  sat  at 
his  right  hand. 

"  I  think  she  is, "  said  Celia,  feeling  afraid  lest 
she  should  say  something  that  would  not  please 
her  sister,  and  blushing  as  prettily  as  possible 
above  her  necklace.  "  She  likes  giving  up. " 

"  If  that  were  true,  Celia,  my  giving-up  would 
be  self-indulgence,  not  self-mortification.  But 
there  may  be  good  reasons  for  choosing  not  to  do 
what  is  very  agreeable,"  said  Dorothea. 

Mr.  Brooke  was  speaking  at  the  same  time,  but 
it  was  evident  that  Mr.  Casaubon  was  observing 
Dorothea,  and  she  was  aware  of  it. 

"  Exactly, "  said  Sir  James.  "  You  give  up  from 
some  high  generous  motive.  " 

"  No,  indeed,  not  exactly.  I  did  not  say  that  of 
myself,"  answered  Dorothea,  reddening.  Unlike 
Celia,  she  rarely  blushed,  and  only  from  high  de- 
light or  anger.  At  this  moment  she  felt  angry 
with  the  perverse  Sir  James.  Why  did  he  not  pay 
attention  to  Celia,  and  leave  her  to  listen  to  Mr. 
Casaubon  ?  —  if  that  learned  man  would  only  talk, 
instead  of  allowing  himself  to  be  talked  to  by  Mr. 
Brooke,  who  was  just  then  informing  him  that  the 
Keformation  either  meant  something  or  it  did  not, 
that  he  himself  was  a  Protestant  to  the  core,  but 
that  Catholicism  was  a  fact ;  and  as  to  refusing  an 


MISS  BROOKE.  21 

acre  of  your  ground  for  a  Eomanist  chapel,  all 
men  needed  the  bridle  of  religion,  which,  properly 
speaking,  was  the  dread  of  a  Hereafter. 

"  I  made  a  great  study  of  theology  at  one  time, " 
said  Mr.  Brooke,  as  if  to  explain  the  insight  just 
manifested.  "  I  know  something  of  all  schools. 
I  knew  Wilberforce  in  his  best  days.  Do  you 
know  Wilberforce  ?  " 

Mr.  Casaubon  said,  "  No.  " 

"  Well,  Wilberforce  was  perhaps  not  enough  of 
a  thinker;  but  if  I  went  into  Parliament,  as  I 
have  been  asked  to  do,  I  should  sit  on  the  inde- 
pendent bench,  as  Wilberforce  did,  and  work  at 
philanthropy.  " 

Mr.  Casaubon  bowed,  and  observed  that  it  was  a 
wide  field. 

"  Yes, "  said  Mr.  Brooke,  with  an  easy  smile ; 
"  but  I  have  documents.  I  began  a  long  while  ago 
to  collect  documents.  They  want  arranging,  but 
when  a  question  has  struck  me,  I  have  written  to 
somebody  and  got  an  answer.  I  have  documents 
at  my  back.  But  now,  how  do  you  arrange  your 
documents  ? " 

"  In  pigeon-holes  partly, "  said  Mr.  Casaubon, 
with  rather  a  startled  air  of  effort. 

"  Ah,  pigeon-holes  will  not  do.  I  have  tried 
pigeon-holes,  but  everything  gets  mixed  in  pigeon- 
holes :  I  never  know  whether  a  paper  is  in  A  or  Z.  " 

"  I  wish  you  would  let  me  sort  your  papers  for 
you,  uncle, "  said  Dorothea.  "  I  would  letter  them 
all,  and  then  make  a  list  of  subjects  under  each 
letter. " 

Mr.  Casaubon  gravely  smiled  approval,  and  said 
to  Mr.  Brooke,  "  You  have  an  excellent  secretary 
at  hand,  you  perceive. " 


22  MtDDLEMARCH. 

"No,  no,"  said  Mr.  Brooke,  shaking  his  head; 
"  I  cannot  let  young  ladies  meddle  with  my  docu~ 
ments.  Young  ladies  are  too  flighty. " 

Dorothea  felt  hurt.  Mr.  Casaubon  would  think 
that  her  uncle  had  some  special  reason  for  deliver- 
ing this  opinion,  whereas  the  remark  lay  in  his 
mind  as  lightly  as  the  broken  wing  of  an  insect 
among  all  the  other  fragments  there,  and  a  chance 
current  had  sent  it  alighting  on  her. 

When  the  two  girls  were  in  the  drawing-room 
alone,  Celia  said,  — 

"  How  very  ugly  Mr.  Casaubon  is !  " 

"  Celia !  He  is  one  of  the  most  distinguished- 
looking  men  I  ever  saw.  He  is  remarkably  like 
the  portrait  of  Locke.  He  has  the  same  deep  eye- 
sockets.  " 

"  Had  Locke  those  two  white  moles  with  hairs 
on  them  ?  " 

"  Oh,  I  dare  say !  when  people  of  a  certain  sort 
looked  at  him,"  said  Dorothea,  walking  away  a 
little. 

"  Mr.  Casaubon  is  so  sallow.  " 

"  All  the  better.  I  suppose  you  admire  a  man 
with  the  complexion  of  a  cochon  de  lait. " 

"  Dodo !  "  exclaimed  Celia,  looking  after  her  in 
surprise.  "  I  never  heard  you  make  such  a  com- 
parison before. " 

"  Why  should  I  make  it  before  the  occasion 
came  ?  It  is  a  good  comparison :  the  match  is 
perfect " 

Miss  Brooke  was  clearly  forgetting  herself,  and 
Celia  thought  so. 

"  I  wonder  you  show  temper,  Dorothea.  " 

"  It  is  so  painful  in  you,  Celia,  that  you  will 
look  at  human  beings  as  if  they  were  merely  ani- 


MISS  BROOKE.  23 

mals  with  a  toilet,  and  never  see  the  great  soul  in 
a  man's  face.  " 

"  Has  Mr.  Casaubon  a  great  soul  ?  "  Celia  was 
not  without  a  touch  of  naive  malice. 

"  Yes,  I  believe  he  has, "  said  Dorothea,  with  the 
full  voice  of  decision.  "  Everything  I  see  in  him 
corresponds  to  his  pamphlet  on  Biblical  Cosmology.  " 

"  He  talks  very  little, "  said  Celia. 

"  There  is  no  one  for  him  to  talk  to.  * 

Celia  thought  privately,  "  Dorothea  quite  de- 
spises Sir  James  Chettam  ;  I  believe  she  would  not 
accept  him.  "  Celia  felt  that  this  was  a  pity.  She 
had  never  been  deceived  as  to  the  object  of  the 
baronet's  interest.  Sometimes,  indeed,  she  had 
reflected  that  Dodo  would  perhaps  not  make  a  hus- 
band happy  who  had  not  her  way  of  looking  at 
things ;  and  stifled  in  the  depths  of  her  heart  was 
the  feeling  that  her  sister  was  too  religious  for 
family  comfort.  Notions  and  scruples  were  like 
spilt  needles,  making  one  afraid  of  treading,  or 
sitting  down,  or  even  eating. 

When  Miss  Brooke  was  at  the  tea-table,  Sir 
James  came  to  sit  down  by  her,  not  having  felt 
her  mode  of  answering  him  at  all  offensive.  Why 
should  he  ?  He  thought  it  probable  that  Miss 
Brooke  liked  him,  and  manners  must  be  very 
marked  indeed  before  they  cease  to  be  interpreted 
by  preconceptions  either  confident  or  distrustful. 
She  was  thoroughly  charming  to  him,  but  of  course 
he  theorized  a  little  about  his  attachment.  He 
was  made  of  excellent  human  dough,  and  had  the 
rare  merit  of  knowing  that  his  talents,  even  if  let 
loose,  would  not  set  the  smallest  stream  in  the 
county  on  fire :  hence  he  liked  the  prospect  of  a 
wife  to  whom  he  could  say,  "  What  shall  we  do  ?  " 


24  MIDDLEMARCH. 

about  this  or  that;  who  could  help  her  husband 
out  with  reasons,  and  would  also  have  the  property 
qualification  for  doing  so.  As  to  the  excessive 
religiousness  alleged  against  Miss  Brooke,  he  had 
a  very  indefinite  notion  of  what  it  consisted  in, 
and  thought  that  it  would  die  out  with  marriage. 
In  short,  he  felt  himself  to  be  in  love  in  the  right 
place,  and  was  ready  to  endure  a  great  deal  of  pre- 
dominance, which,  after  all,  a  man  could  always 
put  down  when  he  liked.  Sir  James  had  no  idea 
that  he  should  ever  like  to  put  down  the  predomi- 
nance of  this  handsome  girl,  in  whose  cleverness 
he  delighted.  Why  not?  A  man's  mind  —  what 
there  is  of  it  —  has  always  the  advantage  of  being 
masculine, — as  the  smallest  birch -tree  is  of  a 
higher  kind  than  the  most  soaring  palm,  —  and 
even  his  ignorance  is  of  a  sounder  quality.  Sir 
James  might  not  have  originated  this  estimate ; 
but  a  kind  Providence  furnishes  the  limpest  per- 
sonality with  a  little  gum  or  starch  in  the  form  of 
tradition. 

"  Let  me  hope  that  you  will  rescind  that  resolu- 
tion about  the  horse,  Miss  Brooke,"  said  the  per- 
severing admirer.  "  I  assure  you,  riding  is  the 
most  healthy  of  exercises. " 

"  I  am  aware  of  it, "  said  Dorothea,  coldly.  "  I 
think  it  would  do  Celia  good,  if  she  would  take 
to  it." 

"  But  you  are  such  a  perfect  horsewoman.  " 

"  Excuse  me ;  I  have  had  very  little  practice, 
and  I  should  be  easily  thrown. " 

"  Then  that  is  a  reason  for  more  practice.  Every 
lady  ought  to  be  a  perfect  horsewoman,  that  she 
may  accompany  her  husband.  " 

"  You  see  how  widely  we  differ,  Sir  James.     I 


MISS  BROOKE.    ,  2< 

have  made  up  my  mind  that  I  ought  not  to  be  a 
perfect  horsewoman,  and  so  I  should  never  corre- 
spond to  your  pattern  of  a  lady.  "  Dorothea  looked 
straight  before  her,  and  spoke  with  cold  brusquerie, 
very  much  with  the  air  of  a  handsome  boy,  in 
amusing  contrast  with  the  solicitous  amiability  of 
her  admirer. 

"  I  should  like  to  know  your  reasons  for  this 
cruel  resolution.  It  is  not  possible  that  you 
should  think  horsemanship  wrong. " 

"  It  is  quite  possible  that  I  should  think  it 
wrong  for  me. " 

"  Oh,  why  ?  "  said  Sir  James,  in  a  tender  tone  of 
remonstrance. 

Mr.  Casaubon  had  come  up  to  the  table,  teacup 
in  hand,  and  was  listening. 

"  We  must  not  inquire  too  curiously  into  mo- 
tives, "  he  interposed,  in  his  measured  way.  "  Miss 
Brooke  knows  that  they  are  apt  to  become  feeble 
in  the  utterance :  the  aroma  is  mixed  with  the 
grosser  air.  We  must  keep  the  germinating  grain 
away  from  the  light. " 

Dorothea  coloured  with  pleasure,  and  looked  up 
gratefully  to  the  speaker.  Here  was  a  man  who 
could  understand  the  higher  inward  life,  and  with 
whom  there  could  be  some  spiritual  communion ; 
nay,  who  could  illuminate  principle  with  the 
widest  knowledge :  a  man  whose  learning  almost 
amounted  to  a  proof  of  whatever  he  believed ! 

Dorothea's  inferences  may  seem  large ;  but  really 
life  could  never  have  gone  on  at  any  period  but  for 
this  liberal  allowance,  of  conclusions,  which  has 
facilitated  marriage  under  the  difficulties  of  civi- 
lization. Has  any  one  ever  pinched  into  its 
pilulous  smallness  the  cobweb  of  pre-matrimonial 
acquaintanceship  1 


26  MTDDLEMARCH. 

"  Certainly, "  said  good  Sir  James.  "  Miss 
Brooke  shall  not  be  urged  to  tell  reasons  she  would 
rather  be  silent  upon.  I  am  sure  her  reasons 
would  do  her  honour. " 

He  was  not  in  the  least  jealous  of  the  interest 
with  which  Dorothea  had  looked  up  at  Mr.  Casau- 
bon  :  it  never  occurred  to  him  that  a  girl  to  whom 
he  was  meditating  an  offer  of  marriage  could  care 
for  a  dried  bookworm  towards  fifty,  except,  in- 
deed, in  a  religious  sort  of  way,  as  for  a  clergyman 
of  some  distinction. 

However,  since  Miss  Brooke  had  become  engaged 
in  a  conversation  with  Mr.  Casaubon  about  the 
Vaudois  clergy,  Sir  James  betook  himself  to  Celia, 
and  talked  to  her  about  her  sister ;  spoke  of  a  house 
in  town,  and  asked  whether  Miss  Brooke  disliked 
London.  Away  from  her  sister,  Celia  talked  quite 
easily,  and  Sir  James  said  to  himself  that  the 
second  Miss  Brooke  was  certainly  very  agreeable 
as  well  as  pretty,  though  not,  as  some  people  pre- 
tended, more  clever  and  sensible  than  the  elder 
sister.  He  felt  that  he  had  chosen  the  one  who 
was  in  all  respects  the  superior;  and  a  man  natu- 
rally likes  to  look  forward  to  having  the  best.  He 
would  be  the  very  Mawworm  of  bachelors  who 
pretended  not  to  expect  it 


CHAPTER  III 

Say,  goddess,  what  ensued,  when  Raphael, 
The  affable  archangel  . .  . 

Eve 

The  story  heard  attentive,  and  was  filled 
With  admiration,  and  deep  muse,  to  hear 
Of  things  so  high  and  strange. 

Paradise  Lost,  B.  vii. 

IF  it  had  really  occurred  to  Mr.  Casaubon  to  think 
of  Miss  Brooke  as  a  suitable  wife  for  him,  the 
reasons  that  might  induce  her  to  accept  him  were 
already  planted  in  her  mind,  and  by  the  even- 
ing of  the  next  day  the  reasons  had  budded  and 
bloomed.  For  they  had  had  a  long  conversation 
in  the  morning,  while  Celia,  who  did  not  like  the 
company  of  Mr.  Casaubon 's  moles  and  sallowness, 
had  escaped  to  the  vicarage  to  play  with  the 
curate's  ill-shod  but  merry  children. 

Dorothea  by  this  time  had  looked  deep  into  the 
ungauged  reservoir  of  Mr.  Casaubon 's  mind,  seeing 
reflected  there  in  vague  labyrinthine  extension  every 
quality  she  herself  brought ;  had  opened  much  of 
her  own  experience  to  him,  and  had  understood 
from  him  the  scope  of  his  great  work,  also  of  at- 
tractively labyrinthine  extent.  For  he  had  been 
as  instructive  as  Milton's  "affable  archangel;" 
and  with  something  of  the  archangelic  manner  he 
told  her  how  he  had  undertaken  to  show  (what 
indeed  had  been  attempted  before,  but  not  with 
that  thoroughness,  justice  of  comparison,  and  effec- 
tiveness of  arrangement  at  which  Mr.  Casaubon 


28  MIDDLEMARCH. 

aimed)  that  all  the  mythical  systems  or  erratic 
mythical  fragments  in  the  world  were  corruptions 
of  a  tradition  originally  revealed.  Having  once 
mastered  the  true  position  and  taken  a  firm  footing 
there,  the  vast  field  of  mythical  constructions  be- 
came intelligible,  nay,  luminous  with  the  reflected 
light  of  correspondences.  But  to  gather  in  this 
great  harvest  of  truth  was  no  light  or  speedy  work. 
His  notes  already  made  a  formidable  range  of  vol- 
umes, but  the  crowning  task  would  be  to  condense 
these  voluminous  still-accumulating  results,  and 
bring  them,  like  the  earlier  vintage  of  Hippocratic 
books,  to  fit  a  little  shelf.  In  explaining  this  to 
Dorothea,  Mr.  Casaubon  expressed  himself  nearly 
as  he  would  have  done  to  a  fellow-student,  for  he 
had  not  two  styles  of  talking  at  command :  it  is 
true  that  when  he  used  a  Greek  or  Latin  phrase  he 
always  gave  the  English  with  scrupulous  care,  but 
he  would  probably  have  done  this  in  any  case.  A 
learned  provincial  clergyman  is  accustomed  to 
think  of  his  acquaintances  as  of  "  lords,  knyghtes, 
and  other  noble  and  worthi  men,  that  conne  Latyn 
but  lytille. " 

Dorothea  was  altogether  captivated  by  the  wide 
embrace  of  this  conception.  Here  was  something 
beyond  the  shallows  of  ladies '-school  literature: 
here  was  a  living  Bossuet,  whose  work  would 
reconcile  complete  knowledge  with  devoted  piety ; 
here  was  a  modern  Augustine  who  united  the 
glories  of  doctor  and  saint. 

The  sanctity  seemed  no  less  clearly  marked  than 
the  learning,  for  when  Dorothea  was  impelled  to 
open  her  mind  on  certain  themes  which  she  could 
speak  of  to  no  one  whom  she  had  before  seen  at 
Tipton,  especially  on  the  secondary  importance  of 


MISS  BROOKE.  ±9 

ecclesiastical  forms  and  articles  of  belief  compared 
with  that  spiritual  religion,  that  submergence  of  self 
in  communion  with  Divine  perfection  which  seemed 
to  her  to  be  expressed  in  the  best  Christian  books  of 
widely  distant  ages,  she  found  in  Mr.  Casaubon  a 
listener  who  understood  her  at  once,  who  could  as- 
sure her  of  his  own  agreement  with  that  view  when 
duly  tempered  with  wise  conformity,  and  could  men- 
tion historical  examples  before  unknown  to  her. 

"  He  thinks  with  me, "  said  Dorothea  to  herself, 
"  or  rather,  he  thinks  a  whole  world  of  which  my 
thought  is  but  a  poor  twopenny  mirror.  And  his 
feelings  too,  his  whole  experience,  —  what  a  lake 
compared  with  my  little  pool !  " 

Miss  Brooke  argued  from  words  and  dispositions 
not  less  unhesitatingly  than  other  young  ladies  of 
her  age.  Signs  are  small  measurable  things,  but 
interpretations  are  illimitable,  and  in  girls  of 
sweet,  ardent  nature,  every  sign  is  apt  to  conjure 
up  wonder,  hope,  belief,  vast  as  a  sky,  and  coloured 
by  a  diffused  thimbleful  of  matter  in  the  shape  of 
knowledge.  They  are  not  always  too  grossly  de- 
ceived ;  for  Sinbad  himself  may  have  fallen  by 
good-luck  on  a  true  description,  and  wrong  reason- 
ing sometimes  lands  poor  mortals  in  right  conclu- 
sions :  starting  a  long  way  off  the  true  point,  and 
proceeding  by  loops  and  zigzags,  we  now  and  then 
arrive  just  where  we  ought  to  be.  Because  Miss 
Brooke  was  hasty  in  her  trust,  it  is  not  therefore 
clear  that  Mr.  Casaubon  was  unworthy  of  it. 

He  stayed  a  little  longer  than  he  had  intended, 
on  a  slight  pressure  of  invitation  from  Mr.  Brooke, 
who  offered  no  bait  except  his  own  documents  on 
machine-breaking  and  rick-burning.  Mr.  Casaubon 
was  called  into  the  library  to  look  at  these  in  a 


30  MIDDLEMARCH. 

heap,  while  his  host  picked  up  firat  one  and  then 
the  other  to  read  aloud  from  in  a  skipping  and 
uncertain  way,  passing  from  one  unfinished  passage 
to  another  with  a  "  Yes,  now,  but  here ! "  and 
finally  pushing  them  all  aside  to  open  the  journal 
of  his  youthful  Continental  travels. 

"  Look  here,  —  here  is  all  about  Greece.  Kham- 
nus,  the  ruins  of  Ehamnus,  —  you  are  a  great 
Grecian,  now.  I  don't  know  whether  you  have 
given  much  study  to  the  topography.  I  spent  no 
end  of  time  in  making  out  these  things,  —  Helicon, 
now.  Here,  now !  — '  We  started  the  next  morn- 
ing for  Parnassus,  the  double-peaked  Parnassus. ' 
All  this  volume  is  about  Greece,  you  know, "  Mr. 
Brooke  wound  up,  rubbing  his  thumb  transversely 
along  the  edges  of  the  leaves  as  he  held  the  book 
forward. 

Mr.  Casaubon  made  a  dignified  though  some- 
what sad  audience ;  bowed  in  the  right  place,  and 
avoided  looking  at  anything  documentary  as  far  as 
possible,  without  showing  disregard  or  impatience ; 
mindful  that  this  desultoriness  was  associated  with 
the  institutions  of  the  country,  and  that  the  man 
who  took  him  on  this  severe  mental  scamper  was 
not  only  an  amiable  host,  but  a  landholder  and 
custos  rotulorum.  Was  his  endurance  aided  also 
by  the  reflection  that  Mr.  Brooke  was  the  uncle  of 
Dorothea  ? 

Certainly  he  seemed  more  and  more  bent  on 
making  her  talk  to  him,  on  drawing  her  out,  as 
Celia  remarked  to  herself;  and  in  looking  at  her 
his  face  was  often  lit  up  by  a  smile  like  pale  win- 
try sunshine.  Before  he  left  the  next  morning, 
while  taking  a  pleasant  walk  with  Miss  Brooke 
along  the  gravelled  terrace,  he  had  mentioned  to 


MISS  BROOKE.  31 

her  that  he  felt  the  disadvantage  of  loneliness,  the 
need  of  that  cheerful  companionship  with  which 
the  presence  of  youth  can  lighten  or  vary  the 
serious  toils  of  maturity.  And  he  delivered  this 
statement  with  as  much  careful  precision  as  if  he 
had  been  a  diplomatic  envoy  whose  words  would 
be  attended  with  results.  Indeed,  Mr.  Casaubou 
was  not  used  to  expect  that  he  should  have  to 
repeat  or  revise  his  communications  of  a  practical 
or  personal  kind.  The  inclinations  which  he  had 
deliberately  stated  on  the  2d  of  October  he  would 
think  it  enough  to  refer  to  by  the  mention  of  that 
date ;  judging  by  the  standard  of  his  own  memory, 
which  was  a  volume  where  a  vide  supra  could  serve 
instead  of  repetitions,  and  not  the  ordinary  long- 
used  blotting-book  which  only  tells  of  forgotten 
writing.  But  in  this  case  Mr.  Casaubon's  confi- 
dence was  not  likely  to  be  falsified,  for  Dorothea 
heard  and  retained  what  he  said  with  the  eager 
interest  of  a  fresh  young  nature  to  which  every 
variety  in  experience  is  an  epoch. 

It  was  three  o'clock  in  the  beautiful  breezy 
autumn  day  when  Mr.  Casaubon  drove  off  to  his 
Eectory  at  Lowick,  only  five  miles  from  Tipton ; 
and  Dorothea,  who  had  on  her  bonnet  and  shawl, 
hurried  along  the  shrubbery  and  across  the  park 
that  she  might  wander  through  the  bordering  wood 
with  no  other  visible  companionship  than  that  of 
Monk,  the  Great  St.  Bernard  dog,  who  always  took 
care  of  the  young  ladies  in  their  walks.  There 
had  risen  before  her  the  girl's  vision  of  a  possible 
future  for  herself  to  which  she  looked  forward  with 
trembling  hope,  and  she  wanted  to  wander  on  in 
that  visionary  future  without  interruption.  She 
walked  briskly  in  the  brisk  air,  the  colour  rose  in 


32  MIDDLEMARCH. 

her  cheeks,  and  her  straw  bonnet  (which  our  con- 
temporaries might  look  at  with  conjectural  curios- 
ity as  at  an  obsolete  form  of  basket)  fell  a  little 
backward.  She  would  perhaps  be  hardly  charac- 
terized enough  if  it  were  omitted  that  she  wore  her 
brown  hair  flatly  braided  and  coiled  behind  so  as 
to  expose  the  outline  of  her  head  in  a  daring  man- 
ner at  a  time  when  public  feeling  required  the 
meagreness  of  nature  to  be  dissimulated  by  tall 
barricades  of  frizzed  curls  and  bows,  never  sur- 
passed by  any  great  race  except  the  Feejeean. 
This  was  a  trait  of  Miss  Brooke's  asceticism. 
But  there  was  nothing  of  an  ascetic's  expression 
in  her  bright  full  eyes,  as  she  looked  before  her, 
not  consciously  seeing,  but  absorbing  into  the  in- 
tensity of  her  mood,  the  solemn  glory  of  the  after- 
noon with  its  long  swathes  of  light  between  the 
far-off  rows  of  limes,  whose  shadows  touched  each 
other. 

All  people,  young  or  old  (that  is,  all  people  in 
those  ante-reform  times),  would  have  thought  her 
an  interesting  object  if  they  had  referred  the  glow 
in  her  eyes  and  cheeks  to  the  newly  awakened 
ordinary  images  of  young  love :  the  illusions  of 
Chloe  about  Strephon  have  been  sufficiently  conse- 
crated in  poetry,  as  the  pathetic  loveliness  of  all 
spontaneous  trust  ought  to  be.  Miss  Pippin  ador- 
ing young  Pumpkin,  and  dreaming  along  endless 
vistas  of  unwearying  companionship,  was  a  little 
drama  which  never  tired  our  fathers  and  mothers, 
and  had  been  put  into  all  costumes.  Let  but 
Pumpkin  have  a  figure  which  would  sustain  the 
disadvantages  of  the  short-waisted  swallow-tail, 
and  everybody  felt  it  not  only  natural  but  neces- 
sary to  the  perfection  of  womanhood,  that  a  sweet 


MISS  BROOKE.  33 

girl  should  be  at  once  convinced  of  his  virtue,  his 
exceptional  ability,  and  above  all,  his  perfect  sin- 
cerity. But  perhaps  no  persons  then  living  — - 
certainly  none  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Tipton  — 
would  have  had  a  sympathetic  understanding  for  the 
dreams  of  a  girl  whose  notions  about  marriage  took 
their  colour  entirely  from  an  exalted  enthusiasm 
about  the  ends  of  life,  an  enthusiasm  which  was 
lit  chiefly  by  its  own  fire,  and  included  neither  the 
niceties  of  the  trousseau,  the  pattern  of  plate,  nor 
even  the  honours  and  sweet  joys  of  the  blooming 
matron. 

It  had  now  entered  Dorothea's  mind  that  Mr. 
Casaubon  might  wish  to  make  her  his  wife,  and 
the  idea  that  he  would  do  so  touched  her  with  a 
sort  of  reverential  gratitude.  How  good  of  him, 
—  nay,  it  would  be  almost  as  if  a  winged  messen- 
ger had  suddenly  stood  beside  her  path  and  held 
out  his  hand  towards  her !  For  a  long  while  she 
had  been  oppressed  by  the  indefiniteness  which 
hung  in  her  mind,  like  a  thick  summer  haze,  over 
all  her  desire  to  make  her  life  greatly  effective. 
What  could  she  do,  what  ought  she  to  do?  —  she, 
hardly  more  than  a  budding  woman,  but  yet  with 
an  active  conscience  and  a  great  mental  need,  not 
to  be  satisfied  by  a  girlish  instruction  comparable 
to  the  nibblings  and  judgments  of  a  discursive 
mouse.  With  some  endowment  of  stupidity  and 
conceit,  she  might  have  thought  that  a  Christian 
young  lady  of  fortune  should  find  her  ideal  of  life 
in  village  charities,  patronage  of  the  humbler 
clergy,  the  perusal  of  "  Female  Scripture  Charac- 
ters, "  unfolding  the  private  experience  of  Sara 
under  the  Old  Dispensation,  and  Dorcas  under  the 
New,  and  the  care  of  her  soul  over  her  embroidery 

VOL.  I.  —  3 


34  MIDDLEMARCH. 

in  her  own  boudoir,  —  with  a  background  of  pro- 
spective marriage  to  a  man  who,  if  less  strict  than 
herself,  as  being  involved  in  affairs  religiously 
inexplicable,  might  be  prayed  for  and  seasonably 
exhorted.  From  such  contentment  poor  Dorothea 
was  shut  out.  The  intensity  of  her  religious  dis- 
position, the  coercion  it  exercised  over  her  life, 
was  but  one  aspect  of  a  nature  altogether  ardent, 
theoretic,  and  intellectually  consequent :  and  with 
such  a  nature  struggling  in  the  bands  of  a  narrow 
teaching,  hemmed  in  by  a  social  life  which  seemed 
nothing  but  a  labyrinth  of  petty  courses,  a  walled- 
in  maze  of  small  paths  that  led  no  whither,  the 
outcome  was  sure  to  strike  others  as  at  once  ex- 
aggeration and  inconsistency.  The  thing  which 
seemed  to  her  best,  she  wanted  to  justify  by  the 
completest  knowledge ;  and  not  to  live  in  a  pre- 
tended admission  of  rules  which  were  never  acted 
on.  Into  this  soul-hunger  as  yet  all  her  youthful 
passion  was  poured ;  the  union  which  attracted  her 
was  one  that  would  deliver  her  from  her  girlish 
subjection  to  her  own  ignorance,  and  give  her  the 
freedom  of  voluntary  submission  to  a  guide  who 
would  take  her  along  the  grandest  path. 

"  I  should  learn  everything  then,"  she  said  to  her- 
self, still  walking  quickly  along  the  bridle-road 
through  the  wood.  "  It  would  be  my  duty  to  study 
that  I  might  help  him  the  better  in  his  great  works. 
There  would  be  nothing  trivial  about  our  lives. 
Every-day  things  with  us  would  mean  the  greatest 
things.  It  would  be  like  marrying  Pascal.  I 
should  learn  to  see  the  truth  by  the  same  light  as 
great  men  have  seen  it  by.  And  then  I  should 
know  what  to  do  when  I  got  older :  I  should  see 
how  it  was  possible  to  lead  a  grand  life  here  — 


MISS  BROOKE.  35 

now  —  in  England.  I  don't  feel  sure  about  doing 
good  in  any  way  now  :  everything  seems  like  going 
on  a  mission  to  a  people  whose  language  I  don't 
know;  —  unless  it  were  building  good  cottages,  — 
there  can  be  no  doubt  about  that.  Oh,  I  hope  I 
should  be  able  to  get  the  people  well  housed  in 
Lowick !  I  will  draw  plenty  of  plans  while  I 
have  time. " 

Dorothea  checked  herself  suddenly  with  self- 
rebuke  for  the  presumptuous  way  in  which  she 
was  reckoning  on  uncertain  events,  but  she  was 
spared  any  inward  effort  to  change  the  direction  of 
her  thoughts  by  the  appearance  of  a  cantering 
horseman  round  a  turning  of  the  road.  The  well- 
groomed  chestnut  horse  and  two  beautiful  setters 
could  leave  no  doubt  that  the  rider  was  Sir  James 
Chettam.  He  discerned  Dorothea,  jumped  off  his 
horse  at  once,  and,  having  delivered  it  to  his 
groom,  advanced  towards  her  with  something 
white  on  his  arm,  at  which  the  two  setters  were 
barking  in  an  excited  manner. 

"  How  delightful  to  meet  you,  Miss  Brooke, "  he 
said,  raising  his  hat  and  showing  his  sleekly  wav- 
ing blond  hair.  "  It  has  hastened  the  pleasure  I 
was  looking  forward  to. " 

Miss  Brooke  was  annoyed  at  the  interruption. 
This  amiable  baronet,  really  a  suitable  husband 
for  Celia,  exaggerated  the  necessity  of  making 
himself  agreeable  to  the  elder  sister.  Even  a  pro- 
spective brother-in-law  may  be  an  oppression  if  he 
will  always  be  presupposing  too  good  an  under- 
standing with  you,  and  agreeing  with  you  even 
when  you  contradict  him.  The  thought  that  he 
had  made  the  mistake  of  paying  his  addresses  to 
herself  could  not  take  shape :  all  her  mental  activ- 


36  MIDDLEMARCH. 

ity  was  used  up  in  persuasions  of  another  kind 
But  he  was  positively  obtrusive  at  this  moment, 
and  his  dimpled  hands  were  quite  disagreeable. 
Her  roused  temper  made  her  colour  deeply,  as  she 
returned  his  greeting  with  some  haughtiness. 

Sir  James  interpreted  the  heightened  colour  in 
the  way  most  gratifying  to  himself,  and  thought 
he  never  saw  Miss  Brooke  looking  so  handsome. 

"  I  have  brought  a  little  petitioner, "  he  said, 
*  or  rather,  I  have  brought  him  to  see  if  he  will  be 
approved  before  his  petition  is  offered.  "  He  showed 
the  white  object  under  his  arm,  which  was  a  tiny 
Maltese  puppy,  one  of  nature's  most  naive  toys. 

"  It  is  painful  to  me  to  see  these  creatures  that 
are  bred  merely  as  pets, "  said  Dorothea,  whose 
opinion  was  forming  itself  that  very  moment  (as 
opinions  will)  under  the  heat  of  irritation. 

"  Oh,  why  ?  "  said  Sir  James,  as  they  walked 
forward. 

"  I  believe  all  the  petting  that  is  given  them 
does  not  make  them  happy.  They  are  too  help- 
less :  their  lives  are  too  frail.  A  weasel  or  a 
mouse  that  gets  its  own  living  is  more  interesting. 
I  like  to  think  that  the  animals  about  us  have 
souls  something  like  our  own,  and  either  carry  on 
their  own  little  affairs  or  can  be  companions  to  us, 
like  Monk  here.  Those  creatures  are  parasitic.  " 

"  I  am  so  glad  I  know  that  you  do  not  like 
them, "  said  good  Sir  James.  "  I  should  never 
keep  them  for  myself,  but  ladies  usually  are  fond 
of  these  Maltese  dogs.  Here,  John,  take  this  dog, 
will  you  ?  " 

The  objectionable  puppy,  whose  nose  and  eyes 
were  equally  black  and  expressive,  was  thus  got 
rid  of,  since  Miss  Brooke  decided  that  it  had  better 


MISS  BROOKE.  37 

not  have  been  born.  But  she  felt  it  necessary  to 
explain. 

"  You  must  not  judge  of  Celia's  feeling  from 
mine.  I  think  she  likes  these  small  pets.  She 
had  a  tiny  terrier  once,  which  she  was  very  fond 
of.  It  made  me  unhappy,  because  I  was  afraid  of 
treading  on  it.  I  am  rather  short-sighted. " 

"  You  have  your  own  opinion  about  everything, 
Miss  Brooke,  and  it  is  always  a  good  opinion. " 

What  answer  was  possible  to  such  stupid  com- 
plimenting ? 

"  Do  you  know,  I  envy  you  that, "  Sir  James 
said,  as  they  continued  walking  at  the  rather  brisk 
pace  set  by  Dorothea. 

"  I  don't  quite  understand  what  you  mean. " 

"  Your  power  of  forming  an  opinion.  I  can  form 
an  opinion  of  persons.  I  know  when  I  like  people. 
But  about  other  matters,  do  you  know,  I  have  often 
a  difficulty  in  deciding.  One  hears  very  sensible 
things  said  on  opposite  sides.  " 

"  Or  that  seem  sensible.  Perhaps  we  don't 
always  discriminate  between  sense  and  nonsense.  " 

Dorothea  felt  that  she  was  rather  rude. 

"  Exactly, "  said  Sir  James.  "  But  you  seem  to 
have  the  power  of  discrimination. " 

"  On  the  contrary,  I  am  often  unable  to  decide. 
But  that  is  from  ignorance.  The  right  conclusion 
is  there  all  the  same,  though  I  am  unable  to  see 
it." 

"  I  think  there  are  few  who  would  see  it  more 
readily.  Do  you  know,  Lovegood  was  telling  me 
yesterday  that  you  had  the  best  notion  in  the 
world  of  a  plan  for  cottages,  —  quite  wonderful 
for  a  young  lady,  he  thought.  You  had  a  real 
genus,  to  use  his  expression.  He  said  you  wanted 


38  MIDDLEMAKCH. 

Mr.  Brooke  to  build  a  new  set  of  cottages,  but  he 
seemed  to  think  it  hardly  probable  that  your  uncle 
would  consent.  Do  you  know,  that  is  one  of  the 
things  I  wish  to  do,  —  I  mean,  on  my  own  estate. 
I  should  be  so  glad  to  carry  out  that  plan  of  yours, 
if  you  would  let  me  see  it.  Of  course,  it  is  sinking 
money ;  that  is  why  people  object  to  it.  Labourers 
can  never  pay  rent  to  make  it  answer.  But,  after 
all,  it  is  worth  doing.  " 

"  Worth  doing !  yes,  indeed, "  said  Dorothea,  en- 
ergetically, forgetting  her  previous  small  vexations. 
"  I  think  we  deserve  to  be  beaten  out  of  our  beau- 
tiful houses  with  a  scourge  of  small  cords,  —  all  of 
us  who  let  tenants  live  in  such  sties  as  we  see 
round  us.  Life  in  cottages  might  be  happier  than 
ours,  if  they  were  real  houses  fit  for  human  beings 
from  whom  we  expect  duties  and  affections. " 

"  Will  you  show  me  your  plan  ?  " 

"  Yes,  certainly.  I  dare  say  it  is  very  faulty. 
But  I  have  been  examining  all  the  plans  for  cot- 
tages in  London's  book,  and  picked  out  what 
seem  the  best  things.  Oh,  what  a  happiness  it 
would  be  to  set  the  pattern  about  here !  I  think, 
instead  of  Lazarus  at  the  gate,  we  should  put  the 
pigsty  cottages  outside  the  park -gate. " 

Dorothea,  was  in  the  best  temper  now.  Sir 
James,  as  brother-in-law,  building  model  cottages 
on  his  estate,  and  then,  perhaps,  others  being  built 
at  Lowick,  and  more  and  more  elsewhere  in  imita- 
tion, —  it  would  be  as  if  the  spirit  of  Oberlin  had 
passed  over  the  parishes  to  make  the  life  of  poverty 
beautiful ! 

Sir  James  saw  all  the  plans,  and  took  one  away 
to  consult  upon  with  Lovegood.  He  also  took 
away  a  complacent  sense  that  he  was  making  great 


MISS  BROOKE.  39 

progress  in  Miss  Brooke's  good  opinion.  The 
Maltese  puppy  was  not  offered  to  Celia, —  an  omis- 
sion which  Dorothea  afterwards  thought  of  with 
surprise ;  but  she  blamed  herself  for  it.  She  had 
been  engrossing  Sir  James.  After  all,  it  was  a 
relief  that  there  was  no  puppy  to  tread  upon. 

Celia  was  present  while  the  plans  were  being 
examined,  and  observed  Sir  James's  illusion.  "  He 
thinks  that  Dodo  cares  about  him,  and  she  only 
cares  about  her  plans.  Yet  I  am  not  certain  that 
she  would  refuse  him  if  she  thought  he  would  let 
her  manage  everything  and  carry  out  all  her  no- 
tions. And  how  very  uncomfortable  Sir  James 
would  be !  I  cannot  bear  notions. " 

It  was  Celia's  private  luxury  to  indulge  in  this 
dislike.  She  dared  not  confess  it  to  her  sister  in 
any  direct  statement,  for  that  would  be  laying  her- 
self open  to  a  demonstration  that  she  was  some- 
how or  other  at  war  with  all  goodness.  But  on 
safe  opportunities,  she  had  an  indirect  mode  of 
making  her  negative  wisdom  tell  upon  Dorothea, 
and  calling  her  down  from  her  rhapsodic  mood  by 
reminding  her  that  people  were  staring,  not  listen- 
ing. Celia  was  not  impulsive :  what  she  had  to 
say  could  wait,  and  came  from  her  always  with 
the  same  quiet  staccato  evenness.  When  people 
talked  with  energy  and  emphasis,  she  watched  their 
faces  and  features  merely.  She  never  could  un- 
derstand how  well-bred  persons  consented  to  sing 
and  open  their  mouths  in  the  ridiculous  manner 
requisite  for  that  vocal  exercise. 

It  was  not  many  days  before  Mr.  Casaubon  paid 
a  morning  visit,  on  which  he  was  invited  again 
for  the  following  week  to  dine  and  stay  the  night. 
Thus  Dorothea  had  three  more  conversations  with 


40  MIDDLEMARCH. 

him,  and  was  convinced  that  her  first  impressions 
had  been  just.  He  was  all  she  had  at  first  im- 
agined him  to  be :  almost  everything  he  had  said 
seemed  like  a  specimen  from  a  mine,  or  the  in- 
scription on  the  door  of  a  museum  which  might 
open  on  the  treasures  of  past  ages ;  and  this  trust 
in  his  mental  wealth  was  all  the  deeper  and  more 
effective  on  her  inclination  because  it  was  now 
obvious  that  his  visits  were  made  for  her  sake. 
This  accomplished  man  condescended  to  think  of 
a  young  girl,  and  take  the  pains  to  talk  to  her, 
not  with  absurd  compliment,  but  with  an  appeal 
to  her  understanding,  and  sometimes  with  instruc- 
tive correction.  What  delightful  companionship! 
Mr.  Casaubon  seemed  even  unconscious  that  trivi- 
alities existed,  and  never  handed  round  that  small- 
talk  of  heavy  men  which  is  as  acceptable  as  stale 
bride-cake  brought  forth  with  an  odour  of  cupboard. 
He  talked  of  what  he  was  interested  in,  or  else  he 
was  silent  and  bowed  with  sad  civility.  To  Doro- 
thea this  was  adorable  genuineness,  and  religious 
abstinence  from  that  artificiality  which  uses  up 
the  soul  in  the  efforts  of  pretence.  For  she  looked 
as  reverently  at  Mr.  Casaubon 's  religious  elevation 
above  herself  as  she  did  at  his  intellect  and  learn- 
ing. He  assented  to  her  expressions  of  devout 
feeling,  and  usually  with  an  appropriate  quotation  ; 
he  allowed  himself  to  say  that  he  had  gone  through 
some  spiritual  conflicts  in  his  youth;  in  short, 
Dorothea  saw  that  here  she  might  reckon  on  un- 
derstanding, sympathy,  and  guidance.  On  one  — 
only  one  —  of  her  favourite  themes  she  was  disap- 
pointed. Mr.  Casaubon  apparently  did  not  care 
about  building  cottages,  and  diverted  the  talk  to 
the  extremely  narrow  accommodation  which  was 


MISS  BROOKE.  41 

to  be  had  in  the  dwellings  of  the  ancient  Egyp- 
tians, as  if  to  check  a  too  high  standard.  After  he 
was  gone,  Dorothea  dwelt  with  some  agitation  on 
this  indifference  of  his;  and  her  mind  was  much 
exercised  with  arguments  drawn  from  the  varying 
conditions  of  climate  which  modify  human  needs, 
and  from  the  admitted  wickedness  of  pagan  des- 
pots. Should  she  not  urge  these  arguments  on  Mr. 
Casaubon  when  he  came  again  ?  But  further  re- 
flection told  her  that  she  was  presumptuous  in 
demanding  his  attention  to  such  a  subject ;  he 
would  not  disapprove  of  her  occupying  herself  with 
it  in  leisure  moments,  as  other  women  expected  to 
occupy  themselves  with  their  dress  and  embroidery, 
—  would  not  forbid  it  when  —  Dorothea  felt  rather 
ashamed  as  she  detected  herself  in  these  specula- 
tions. But  her  uncle  had  been  invited  to  go  to 
Lowick  to  stay  a  couple  of  days :  was  it  reasonable 
to  suppose  that  Mr.  Casaubon  delighted  in  Mr. 
Brooke's  society  for  its  own  sake,  either  with  or 
without  documents  ? 

Meanwhile  that  little  disappointment  made  her 
delight  the  more  in  Sir  James  Chettam's  readiness 
to  set  on  foot  the  desired  improvements.  He  came 
much  oftener  than  Mr.  Casaubon,  and  Dorothea 
ceased  to  find  him  disagreeable  since  he  showed 
himself  so  entirely  in  earnest ;  for  he  had  already 
entered  with  much  practical  ability  into  Love- 
good's  estimates,  and  was  charmingly  docile.  She 
proposed  to  build  a  couple  of  cottages,  and  trans- 
fer two  families  from  their  old  cabins,  which  could 
then  be  pulled  down,  so  that  new  ones  could  be 
built  on  the  old  sites.  Sir  James  said,  "  Exactly ;  " 
and  she  bore  the  word  remarkably  well. 

Certainly  these  men  who  had  so  few  spontaneous 


42  MIDDLEMA.RCH. 

ideas  might  be  very  useful  members  of  society 
under  good  feminine  direction,  if  they  were  fortu- 
nate in  choosing  their  sisters-in-law !  It  is  diffi- 
cult to  say  whether  there  was  or  was  not  a  little 
wilfulness  in  her  continuing  blind  to  the  possibil- 
ity that  another  sort  of  choice  was  in  question  in 
relation  to  her.  But  her  life  was  just  now  full  of 
hope  and  action :  she  was  not  only  thinking  of 
her  plans,  but  getting  down  learned  books  from 
the  library  and  reading  many  things  hastily  (that 
she  might  be  a  little  less  ignorant  in  talking  to 
Mr.  Casaubon),  all  the  while  being  visited  with 
conscientious  questionings  whether  she  were  not 
exalting  these  poor  doings  above  measure  and  con- 
templating them  with  that  self-satisfaction  which 
was  the  last  doom  of  ignorance  and  folly. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

"  1st  Gent.  Our  deeds  are  fetters  that  we  forge  ourselves. 
2d  Gent.   Ay,  truly :  but  I  think  it  is  the  world 
That  brings  the  iron." 

*  SIR  JAMES  seems  determined  to  do  everything  you 
wish, "  said  Celia,  as  they  were  driving  home  from 
an  inspection  of  the  new  building-site. 

"  He  is  a  good  creature,  and  more  sensible 
than  any  one  would  imagine,"  said  Dorothea, 
inconsiderately. 

"  You  mean  that  he  appears  silly. " 

"  No,  no, "  said  Dorothea,  recollecting  herself, 
and  laying  her  hand  on  her  sister's  a  moment; 
"  but  he  does  not  talk  equally  well  on  all  subjects.  " 

"  I  should  think  none  but  disagreeable  people 
do, "  said  Celia,  in  her  usual  purring  way.  "  They 
must  be  very  dreadful  to  live  with.  Only  think ! 
at  breakfast,  and  always. " 

Dorothea  laughed.  "  Oh,  Kitty,  you  are  a  won- 
derful creature! "  She  pinched  Celia' s  chin,  being 
in  the  mood  now  to  think  her  very  winning  and 
lovely,  —  fit  hereafter  to  be  an  eternal  cherub,  and 
if  it  were  not  doctrinally  wrong  to  say  so,  hardly 
more  in  need  of  salvation  than  a  squirrel.  "  Of 
course  people  need  not  be  always  talking  well. 
Only  one  tells  the  quality  of  their  minds  when 
they  try  to  talk  well. " 

"  You  mean  that  Sir  James  tries  and  fails.  " 

"  I  was  speaking  generally.  Why  do  you  cate- 
chise me  about  Sir  James  ?  It  is  not  the  object  of 
his  life  to  please  me. " 


44  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  Now,  Dodo,  can  you  really  believe  that  ?  " 

"  Certainly.  He  thinks  of  me  as  a  future  sister, 
—  that  is  all. "  Dorothea  had  never  hinted  this 
before,  waiting,  from  a  certain  shyness  on  such 
subjects  which  was  mutual  between  the  sisters, 
until  it  should  be  introduced  by  some  decisive 
event.  Celia  blushed,  but  said  at  once, — 

"  Pray  do  not  make  that  mistake  any  longer, 
Dodo.  When  Tantripp  was  brushing  my  hair  the 
other  day,  she  said  that  Sir  James's  man  knew 
from  Mrs.  Cadwallader's  maid  that  Sir  James  was 
to  marry  the  eldest  Miss  Brooke. " 

"  How  can  you  let  Tantripp  talk  such  gossip  to 
you,  Celia  ? "  said  Dorothea,  indignantly,  not  the 
less  angry  because  details  asleep  in  her  memory 
were  now  awakened  to  confirm  the  unwelcome 
revelation.  "  You  must  have  asked  her  questions. 
It  is  degrading. " 

"  I  see  no  harm  at  all  in  Tantripp 's  talking  to 
me.  It  is  better  to  hear  what  people  say.  You 
see  what  mistakes  you  make  by  taking  up  notions. 
I  am  quite  sure  that  Sir  James,  means  to  make  you 
an  offer;  and  he  believes  that  you  will  accept  him, 
especially  since  you  have  been  so  pleased  with  him 
about  the  plans.  And  uncle  too,  —  I  know  he  ex- 
pects it.  Every  one  can  see  that  Sir  James  is  very 
much  in  love  with  you.  " 

The  revulsion  was  so  strong  and  painful  in 
Dorothea's  mind  that  the  tears  welled  up  and 
flowed  abundantly.  All  her  dear  plans  were  em- 
bittered, and  she  thought  with  disgust  of  Sir 
James's  conceiving  that  she  recognized  him  as  her 
lover.  There  was  vexation  too  on  account  of 
Celia. 

"  How  could  he  expect  it  ?  "  she  burst  forth  in 


MISS  BROOKE.  45 

her  most  impetuous  manner.  "  I  have  never  agreed 
with  him  about  anything  but  the  cottages :  I  was 
barely  polite  to  him  before. " 

"  But  you  have  been  so  pleased  with  him  since 
then ;  he  has  begun  to  feel  quite  sure  that  you  are 
fond  of  him. " 

"  Fond  of  him,  Celia!  How  can  you  choose  such 
odious  expressions  ?  "  said  Dorothea,  passionately. 

"  Dear  me,  Dorothea,  I  suppose  it  would  be  right 
for  you  to  be  fond  of  a  man  whom  you  accepted  for 
a  husband. " 

"  It  is  offensive  to  me  to  say  that  Sir  James 
could  think  I  was  fond  of  him.  Besides,  it  is  not 
the  right  word  for  the  feeling  I  must  have  towards 
the  man  I  would  accept  as  a  husband.  " 

"  Well,  I  am  sorry  for  Sir  James.  I  thought  it 
right  to  tell  you,  because  you  went  on  as  you 
always  do,  never  looking  just  where  you  are,  and 
treading  in  the  wrong  place.  You  always  see  what 
nobody  else  sees ;  it  is  impossible  to  satisfy  you ; 
yet  you  never  see  what  is  quite  plain.  That 's 
your  way,  Dodo.  "  Something  certainly  gave  Celia 
unusual  courage ;  and  she  was  not  sparing  the 
sister  of  whom  she  was  occasionally  in  awe.  Who 
can  tell  what  just  criticisms  Murr  the  Cat  may  be 
passing  on  us  beings  of  wider  speculation  ? 

"  It  is  very  painful, "  said  Dorothea,  feeling 
scourged.  "  I  can  have  no  more  to  do  with  the 
cottages.  I  must  be  uncivil  to  him.  I  must  tell 
him  I  will  have  nothing  to  do  with  them.  It  is 
very  painful.  "  Her  eyes  filled  again  with  tears. 

"  Wait  a  little.  Think  about  it.  You  know  he 
is  going  away  for  a  day  or  two  to  see  his  sister. 
There  will  be  nobody  besides  Lovegood. "  Celia 
could  not  help  relenting.  "  Poor  Dodo !  "  she  went 


46  MIDDLEMAKCH. 

on,  in  an  amiable  staccato.  "  It  is  very  hard :  it 
is  your  favourite  fad  to  draw  plans. " 

"  Fad  to  draw  plans !  Do  you  think  I  only  care 
about  my  fellow-creatures'  houses  in  that  childish 
way  ?  I  may  well  make  mistakes.  How  can  one 
ever  do  anything  nobly  Christian,  living  among 
people  with  such  petty  thoughts  ?  " 

No  more  was  said ;  Dorothea  was  too  much  jarred 
to  recover  her  temper  and  behave  so  as  to  show 
that  she  admitted  any  error  in  herself.  She  was 
disposed  rather  to  accuse  the  intolerable  narrow- 
ness and  the  purblind  conscience  of  the  society 
around  her :  and  Celia  was  no  longer  the  eternal 
cherub,  but  a  thorn  in  her  spirit,  a  pink-and-white 
nullifidian,  worse  than  any  discouraging  presence 
in  the  "  Pilgrim's  Progress. "  The  fad  of  drawing 
plans!  What  was  life  worth,  —  what  great  faith 
was  possible  when  the  whole  effect  of  one's  actions 
could  be  withered  up  into  such  parched  rubbish  as 
that?  When  she  got  out  of  the  carriage,  her 
cheeks  were  pale  and  her  eyelids  red.  She  was  an 
image  of  sorrow  ;  and  her  uncle,  who  met  her  in  the 
hall,  would  have  been  alarmed,  if  Celia  had  not 
been  close  to  her,  looking  so  pretty  and  composed 
that  he  at  once  concluded  Dorothea's  tears  to  have 
their  origin  in  her  excessive  religiousness.  He 
had  returned,  during  their  absence,  from  a  journey 
to  the  county  town,  about  a  petition  for  the  pardon 
of  some  criminal. 

"  Well,  my  dears, "  he  said  kindly,  as  they  went 
up  to  kiss  him,  "  I  hope  nothing  disagreeable  has 
happened  while  I  have  been  away. " 

"  No,  uncle, "  said  Celia,  "  we  have  been  to 
Freshitt  to  look  at  the  cottages.  We  thought  you 
would  have  been  at  home  to  lunch. " 


MISS  BROOKE.  47 

"  I  came  by  Lowick  to  lunch,  —  you  did  n't 
know  I  came  by  Lowick.  And  I  have  brought  a 
couple  of  pamphlets  for  you,  Dorothea,  —  in  the 
library,  you  know;  they  lie  on  the  table  in  the 
library. " 

It  seemed  as  if  an  electric  stream  went  through 
Dorothea,  thrilling  her  from  despair  into  expecta- 
tion. They  were  pamphlets  about  the  early  Church. 
The  oppression  of  Celia,  Tantripp,  and  Sir  James 
was  shaken  off,  and  she  walked  straight  to  the 
library.  Celia  went  upstairs.  Mr.  Brooke  was 
detained  by  a  message,  but  when  he  re-entered  the 
library,  he  found  Dorothea  seated  and  already  deep 
in  one  of  the  pamphlets  which  had  some  mar- 
ginal manuscript  of  Mr.  Casaubon's, —  taking  it 
in  as  eagerly  as  she  might  have  taken  in  the 
scent  of  a  fresh  bouquet  after  a  dry,  hot,  dreary 
walk. 

She  was  getting  away  from  Tipton  and  Freshitt, 
and  her  own  sad  liability  to  tread  in  the  wrong 
places  on  her  way  to  the  New  Jerusalem. 

Mr.  Brooke  sat  down  in  his  arm-chair,  stretched 
his  legs  towards  the  wood-fire,  which  had  fallen 
into  a  wondrous  mass  of  glowing  dice  between  the 
dogs,  and  rubbed  his  hands  gently,  looking  very 
mildly  towards  Dorothea,  but  with  a  neutral 
leisurely  air,  as  if  he  had  nothing  particular  to 
say.  Dorothea  closed  her  pamphlet  as  soon  as 
she  was  aware  of  her  uncle's  presence,  and  rose  as 
if  to  go.  Usually  she  would  have  been  interested 
about  her  uncle's  merciful  errand  on  behalf  of  the 
criminal,  but  her  late  agitation  had  made  her 
absent-minded. 

"  I  came  back  by  Lowick,  you  know, "  said  Mr. 
Brooke,  not  as  if  with  any  intention  to  arrest  her 


48  MIDDLEMARCH. 

departure,  but  apparently  from  his  usual  tendency 
to  say  what  he  had  said  before.  This  fundamental 
principle  of  human  speech  was  markedly  exhibited 
in  Mr.  Brooke.  "  I  lunched  there  and  saw  Casau- 
bon's  library,  and  that  kind  of  thing.  There  's  a 
sharp  air,  driving.  Won't  you  sit  down,  my 
dear  ?  You  look  cold.  " 

Dorothea  felt  quite  inclined  to  accept  the  invi- 
tation. Sometimes,  when  her  uncle's  easy  way 
of  taking  things  did  not  happen  to  be  exasperating, 
it  was  rather  soothing.  She  threw  off  her  mantle 
and  bonnet,  and  sat  down  opposite  to  him,  enjoy- 
ing the  glow,  but  lifting  up  her  beautiful  hands 
for  a  screen.  They  were  not  thin  hands  or  small 
hands,  but  powerful,  feminine,  maternal  hands. 
She  seemed  to  be  holding  them  up  in  propitiation 
for  her  passionate  desire  to  know  and  to  think, 
which  in  the  unfriendly  mediums  of  Tipton  and 
Freshitt  had  issued  in  crying  and  red  eyelids. 

She  bethought  herself  now  of  the  condemned 
criminal.  "  What  news  have  you  brought  about 
the  sheep- stealer,  uncle?" 

"  What,  poor  Bunch  ?  —  well,  it  seems  we  can't 
get  him  off,  —  he  is  to  be  hanged. " 

Dorothea's  brow  took  an  expression  of  reproba- 
tion and  pity. 

"  Hanged,  you  know, "  said  Mr.  Brooke,  with  a 
quiet  nod.  "  Poor  Eomilly  !  he  would  have  helped 
us.  I  knew  Eomilly.  Casaubon  didn't  know 
Eomilly.  He  is  a  little  buried  in  books,  you 
know,  Casaubon  is. " 

"  When  a  man  has  great  studies  and  is  writing  a 
great  work,  he  must  of  course  give  up  seeing  much 
of  the  world.  How  can  he  go  about  making 
acquaintances  ?_" 


MISS  BROOKE.  49 

"  That 's  true.  But  a  man  mopes,  you  know.  I 
have  always  been  a  bachelor  too,  but  I  have  that 
sort  of  disposition  that  I  never  moped ;  it  was  my 
way  to  go  about  everywhere  and  take  in  every- 
thing. I  never  moped ;  but  I  can  see  that  Casau- 
bon  does,  you  know.  He  wants  a  companion,  — 
a  companion,  you  know. " 

"  It  would  be  a  great  honour  to  any  one  to  be 
his  companion,"  said  Dorothea,  energetically. 

"  You  like  him,  eh  ?  "  said  Mr.  Brooke,  without 
showing  any  surprise  or  other  emotion.  "  Well, 
now,  I  've  known  Casaubon  ten  years,  ever  since 
he  came  to  Lowick.  But  I  never  got  anything  out 
of  him, —  any  ideas,  you  know.  However,  he  is 
a  tiptop  man  and  may  be  a  bishop, —  that  kind  of 
thing,  you  know,  if  Peel  stays  in.  And  he  has  a 
very  high  opinion  of  you,  my  dear.  " 

Dorothea  could  not  speak. 

"  The  fact  is,  he  has  a  very  high  opinion  indeed 
of  you.  And  he  speaks  uncommonly  well, —  does 
Casaubon.  He  has  deferred  to  me,  you  not  being  of 
age.  In  short,  I  have  promised  to  speak  to  you, 
though  I  told  him  I  thought  there  was  not  much 
chance.  I  was  bound  to  tell  him  that.  I  said, 
my  niece  is  very  young,  and  that  kind  of  thing. 
But  I  did  n't  think  it  necessary  to  go  into  every- 
thing. However,  the  long  and  the  short  of  it  is, 
that  he  has  asked  my  permission  to  make  you  an 
offer  of  marriage,  —  of  marriage,  you  know, "  said 
Mr.  Brooke,  with  his  explanatory  nod.  "  I  thought 
it  better  to  tell  you,  my  dear.  " 

No  one  could  have  detected  any  anxiety  in  Mr. 
Brooke's  manner,  but  he  did  really  wish  to  know 
something  of  his  niece's  mind,  that,  if  there  were 
any  need  for  advice,  he  might  give  it  in  time. 

VOL.  I.  —  4 


50  MIDDLEMA11CH. 

What  feeling  he,  as  a  magistrate  who  had  taken 
in  so  many  ideas,  could  make  room  for  was  unmix- 
edly  kind.  Since  Dorothea  did  not  speak  imme- 
diately, he  repeated,  "  I  thought  it  better  to  tell 
you,  my  dear. " 

"  Thank  you,  uncle, "  said  Dorothea,  in  a  clear 
unwavering  tone.  "  I  am  very  grateful  to  Mr. 
Casaubon.  If  he  makes  me  an  offer,  I  shall  accept 
him.  I  admire  and  honour  him  more  than  any 
man  I  ever  saw. " 

Mr.  Brooke  paused  a  little,  and  then  said  in  a 
lingering  low  tone,  "  Ah  ?  .  .  .  Well !  He  is  a 
good  match  in  some  respects.  But  now,  Chettam 
is  a  good  match.  And  our  land  lies  together.  I 
shall  never  interfere  against  your  wishes,  my  dear. 
People  should  have  their  own  way  in  marriage, 
and  that  sort  of  thing,  —  up  to  a  certain  point,  you 
know.  I  have  always  said  that,  up  to  a  certain 
point.  I  wish  you  to  marry  well ;  and  I  have  good 
reason  to  believe  that  Chettam  wishes  to  marry 
you.  I  mention  it,  you  know. " 

"  It  is  impossible  that  I  should  ever  marry  Sir 
James  Chettam,"  said  Dorothea.  "  If  he  thinks  of 
marrying  me,  he  has  made  a  great  mistake. " 

"  That  is  it,  you  see.  One  never  knows.  I 
should  have  thought  Chettam  was  just  the  sort  of 
man  a  woman  would  like,  now.  " 

"  Pray  do  not  mention  him  in  that  light  again, 
uncle,"  said  Dorothea,  feeling  some  of  her  late 
irritation  revive. 

Mr.  Brooke  wondered,  and  felt  that  women  were 
an  inexhaustible  subject  of  study,  since  even  he  at 
his  age  was  not  in  a  perfect  state  of  scientific  pre- 
diction about  them.  Here  was  a  fellow  like  Chet- 
tam with  no  chance  at  all. 


MISS  BROOKE.  51 

u  Well,  but  Casaubon,  now.     There  is  no  hurry, 

—  I  mean  for  you.     It 's  true,  every  year  will  tell 
upon  him.     He  is  over  five-and-forty,  you  know. 
I  should  say  a  good  seven-and-twenty  years  older 
than  you.     To  be  sure,  —  if  you  like  learning  and 
standing,   and  that  sort  of  thing,   we  can't  have 
everything.     And  his  income  is  good,  — he  has  a 
handsome  property  independent  of  the  Church,  — 
his  income  is  good.     Still  he  is  not  young,  and  I 
must  not  conceal  from  you,  my  dear,  that  I  think 
his  health  is  not   over-strong.     I   know  nothing 
else  against  him. " 

"  I  should  not  wish  to  have  a  husband  very  near 
my  own  age, "  said  Dorothea,  with  grave  decision. 
"  I  should  wish  to  have  a  husband  who  was  above 
me  in  judgment  and  in  all  knowledge. " 

Mr.  Brooke  repeated  his  subdued,  "  Ah  ?  —  I 
thought  you  had  more  of  your  own  opinion  than 
most  girls.  I  thought  you  liked  your  own  opin- 
ion,—  liked  it,  you  know." 

"  I  cannot  imagine  myself  living  without  some 
opinions,  but  I  should  wish  to  have  good  reasons 
for  them,  and  a  wise  man  could  help  me  to  see 
which  opinions  had  the  best  foundation,  and  would 
help  me  to  live  according  to  them. " 

"  Very  true.     You  could  n't  put  the  thing  better, 

—  could  n't  put  it  better,  beforehand,   you  know. 
But  there  are  oddities  in  things,"  continued  Mr. 
Brooke,  whose  conscience  was  really  roused  to  do 
the  best  he  could  for  his  niece  on  this  occasion. 
"  Life  is  n't  cast  in  a  mould,  —  not  cut  out  by  rule 
and  line,  and  that  sort  of  thing.     I  never  married 
myself,  and  it  will  be  the  better  for  you  and  yours. 
The  fact  is,  I  never  loved  any  one  well  enough  to 
put  myself  into  a  noose  for  them.     It  is  a  noose,  you 


52  MIDDLEMARCH. 

know.  Temper,  now.  There  is  temper.  And  a 
husband  likes  to  be  master." 

"  I  know  that  I  must  expect  trials,  uncle.  Mar- 
riage is  a  state  of  higher  duties.  I  never  thought 
of  it  as  mere  personal  ease,"  said  poor  Dorothea. 

"  Well,  you  are  not  fond  of  show,  a  great  estab- 
lishment, balls,  dinners,  that  kind  of  thing.  I  can 
see  that  Casaubon's  ways  might  suit  you  better  than 
Chettam's.  And  you  shall  do  as  you  like,  my  dear. 
I  would  not  hinder  Casaubon;  I  said  so  at  once; 
for  there  is  no  knowing  how  anything  may  turn 
out  You  have  not  the  same  tastes  as  every  young 
lady ;  and  a  clergyman  and  scholar  —  who  may  be  a 
bishop  —  that  kind  of  thing  —  may  suit  you  better 
than  Chettam.  Chettam  is  a  good  fellow,  a  good 
sound-hearted  fellow,  you  know ;  but  he  does  n't  go 
much  into  ideas.  I  did,  when  I  was  his  age.  But 
Casaubon's  eyes,  now.  I  think  he  has  hurt  them  a 
little  with  too  much  reading." 

"  I  should  be  all  the  happier,  uncle,  the  more 
room  there  was  for  me  to  help  him,"  said  Dorothea, 
ardently. 

"  You  have  quite  made  up  your  mind,  I  see. 
Well,  my  dear,  the  fact  is,  I  have  a  letter  for  you  in 
my  pocket."  Mr.  Brooke  handed  the  letter  to 
Dorothea ;  but  as'  she  rose  to  go  away,  he  added : 
"There  is  not  too  much  hurry,  my  dear.  Think 
about  it,  you  know." 

When  Dorothea  had  left  him,  he  reflected  that 
he  had  certainly  spoken  strongly :  he  had  put  the 
risks  of  marriage  before  her  in  a  striking  manner. 
It  was  his  duty  to  do  so.  But  as  to  pretending  to 
be  wise  for  young  people,  —  no  uncle,  however 
much  he  had  travelled  in  his  youth,  absorbed  the 
new  ideas,  and  dined  with  celebrities  now  deceased, 


MISS  BEOOKE.  53 

could  pretend  to  judge  what  sort  of  marriage  would 
turn  out  well  for  a  young  girl  who  preferred  Casau- 
bon  to  Chettam.  In  short,  woman  was  a  problem 
which,  since  Mr.  Brooke's  mind  felt  blank  before  it, 
could  be  hardly  less  complicated  than  the  revolu- 
tions of  an  irregular  solid. 


CHAPTER  V. 

Hard  students  are  commonly  troubled  with  gowts,  catarrhs, 
rheums,  cachexia,  bradypepsia,  bad  eyes,  stone,  and  collick,  cru- 
dities, oppilations,  vertigo,  winds,  consumptions,  and  all  such 
diseases  as  come  by  over-much  sitting:  they  are  most  part  lean, 
dry,  ill-coloured  .  .  .  and  all  through  immoderate  pains  and  extra- 
ordinary studies.  If  you  will  not  believe  the  truth  of  this 
look  upon  great  Tostatus  and  Thomas  Aquaiuas'  works ;  and  tell 
me  whether  those  men  took  pains.  —  BURTON'S  Anatomy  of  Mel- 
ancholy, P.  I.  s.  2. 

THIS  was  Mr.  Casaubon's  letter. 

MY  DEAR  Miss  BROOKE,  —  I  have  your  guardian's 
permission  to  address  you  on  a  subject  than  which  I 
have  none  more  at  heart.  I  am  not,  I  trust,  mistaken 
in  the  recognition  of  some  deeper  correspondence  than 
that  of  date  in  the  fact  that  a  consciousness  of  need  in 
my  own  life  had  arisen  contemporaneously  with  the  pos- 
sibility of  my  becoming  acquainted  with  you.  For  in 
the  first  hour  of  meeting  you,- 1  had  an  impression  of 
your  eminent  and  perhaps  exclusive  fitness  to  supply 
that  need  (connected,  I  may  say,  with  such  activity  of 
the  affections  as  even  the  preoccupations  of  a  work  too 
special  to  be  abdicated  could  not  uninterruptedly  dis- 
simulate) ;  and  each  succeeding  opportunity  for  obser- 
vation has  given  the  impression  an  added  depth  by 
convincing  me  more  emphatically  of  that  fitness  which  I 
had  preconceived,  and  thus  evoking  more  decisively  those 
affections  to  which  I  have  but  now  referred.  Our  con- 
versations have,  I  think,  made  sufficiently  clear  to  you 
the  tenor  of  my  life  and  purposes :  a  tenor  unsuited,  I 
am  aware,  to  the  commoner  order  of  minds.  But  I 
have  discerned  in  you  an  elevation  of  thought  and  a 


MISS  BROOKE.  55 

capability  of  devotedness  which  I  had  hitherto  not 
conceived  to  be  compatible  either  with  the  early  bloom 
of  youth  or  with  those  graces  of  sex  that  may  be  said  at 
once  to  win  and  to  confer  distinction  when  combined, 
as  they  notably  are  in  you,  with  the  mental  qualities 
above  indicated.  It  was,  I  confess,  beyond  my  hope  to 
meet  with  this  rare  combination  of  elements  both 
solid  and  attractive,  adapted  to  supply  aid  in  graver 
labours  and  to  cast  a  charm  over  vacant  hours ;  and  but 
for  the  event  of  my  introduction  to  you  (which,  let  me 
again  say,  I  trust  not  to  be  superficially  coincident 
with  foreshadowing  needs,  but  providentially  related 
thereto  as  stages  towards  the  completion  of  a  life's 
plan),  I  should  presumably  have  gone  on  to  the  last 
without  any  attempt  to  lighten  my  solitariness  by  a 
matrimonial  union. 

Such,  my  dear  Miss  Brooke,  is  the  accurate  state- 
ment of  my  feelings;  and  I  rely  on  your  kind  indulgence 
in  venturing  now  to  ask  you  how  far  your  own  are  of  a 
nature  to  confirm  my  happy  presentiment.  To  be 
accepted  by  you  as  your  husband  and  the  earthly  guar- 
dian of  your  welfare,  I  should  regard  as  the  highest  of 
providential  gifts.  In  return  I  can  at  least  offer  you 
an  affection  hitherto  unwasted,  and  the  faithful  conse- 
cration of  a  life  which,  however  short  in  the  sequel, 
has  no  backward  pages  whereon,  if  you  choose  to  turn 
them,  you  will  find  records  such  as  might  justly  cause 
you  either  bitterness  or  shame.  I  await  the  expression  of 
your  sentiments  with  an  anxiety  which  it  would  be  the 
part  of  wisdom  (were  it  possible)  to  divert  by  a  more 
arduous  labour  than  usual.  But  in  this  order  of  experi- 
ence I  am  still  young,  and  in  looking  forward  to  au 
unfavourable  possibility  I  cannot  but  feel  that  resig- 
nation to  solitude  will  be  more  difficult  after  the 
temporary  illumination  of  hope. 

In  any  case,  I  shall  remain 

Yours  with  sincere  devotion, 

EDWARD  CASAUBON 


56  MIDDLEMARCH. 

Dorothea  trembled  while  she  read  this  letter; 
then  she  fell  on  her  knees,  buried  her  face,  and 
sobbed.  She  could  not  pray :  under  the  rush  of 
solemn  emotion  in  which  thoughts  became  vague 
and  images  floated  uncertainly,  she  could  but  cast 
herself,  with  a  childlike  sense  of  reclining,  in  the 
lap  of  a  divine  consciousness  which  sustained  her 
own.  She  remained  in  that  attitude  till  it  was 
time  to  dress  for  dinner. 

How  could  it  occur  to  her  to  examine  the  letter, 
to  look  at  it  critically  as  a  profession  of  love  ?  Her 
whole  soul  was  possessed  by  the  fact  that  a  fuller 
life  was  opening  before  her :  she  was  a  neophyte 
about  to  enter  on  a  higher  grade  of  initiation.  She 
was  going  to  have  room  for  the  energies  which 
stirred  uneasily  under  the  dimness  and  pressure  of 
her  own  ignorance  and  the  petty  peremptoriness 
of  the  world's  habits. 

Now  she  would  be  able  to  devote  herself  to  large 
yet  definite  duties ;  now  she  would  be  allowed  to 
live  continually  in  the  light  of  a  mind  that  she 
could  reverence.  This  hope  was  not  unmixed  with 
the  glow  of  proud  delight,  —  the  joyous  maiden 
surprise  that  she  was  chosen  by  the  man  whom  her 
admiration  had  chosen.  All  Dorothea's  passion  was 
transfused  through  a  mind  struggling  towards  an 
ideal  life  ;  the  radiance  of  her  transfigured  girlhood 
fell  on  the  first  object  that  came  within  its  level. 
The  impetus  with  which  inclination  became  resolu- 
tion was  heightened  by  those  little  events  of  the 
day  which  had  roused  her  discontent  with  the 
actual  conditions  of  her  life. 

After  dinner,  when  Celia  was  playing  an  "  air, 
with  variations,"  a  small  kind  of  tinkling  which 
symbolized  the  aesthetic  part  of  the  young  ladies' 


MISS  BROOKE.  $1 

education,  Dorothea  went  up  to  her  room  to  answer 
Mr.  Casaubon's  letter.  Why  should  she  defer  the 
answer  ?  She  wrote  it  over  three  times,  not  because 
she  wished  to  change  the  wording,  but  because  her 
hand  was  unusually  uncertain,  and  she  could  not  bear 
that  Mr.  Casaubon  should  think  her  handwriting 
bad  and  illegible.  She  piqued  herself  on  writing  a 
hand  in  which  each  letter  was  distinguishable  without 
any  large  range  of  conjecture,  and  she  meant  to  make 
much  use  of  this  accomplishment,  to  save  Mr.  Casau- 
bon's eyes.  Three  times  she  wrote. 

My  DEAR  MR.  CASAUBON,  —  I  am  very  grateful  to 
you  for  loving  me,  and  thinking  me  worthy  to  be  your 
wife.  I  can  look  forward  to  110  better  happiness  than 
that  which  would  be  one  with  yours.  If  I  said  more,  it 
would  only  be  the  same  thing  written  out  at  greater 
length,  for  I  cannot  now  dwell  on  any  other  thought 
than  that  I  may  be  through  life 

Yours  devotedly, 

DOROTHEA  BROOKE. 

Later  in  the  evening  she  followed  her  uncle  into 
the  library  to  give  him  the  letter,  that  he  might 
send  it  in  the  morning.  He  was  surprised,  but  his 
surprise  only  issued  in  a  few  moments'  silence,  dur- 
ing which  he  pushed  about  various  objects  on  his 
writing-table,  and  finally  stood  with  his  back  to  the 
fire,  his  glasses  on  his  nose,  looking  at  the  address 
of  Dorothea's  letter. 

"  Have  you  thought  enough  about  this,  my  dear  ? " 
he  said  at  last. 

"  There  was  no  need  to  think  long,  uncle.  I  know 
of  nothing  to  make  me  vacillate.  If  I  changed  my 
mind,  it  must  be  because  of  something  important 
and  entirely  new  to  me." 


S8  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  Ah  !  —  then  you  have  accepted  him  ?  Then 
Chettain  has  no  chance  ?  Has  Chettam  offended 
you,  —  offended  you,  you  know  ?  What  is  it  you 
don't  like  in  Chettam  ? " 

"  There  is  nothing  that  I  like  in  him,"  said  Doro- 
thea, rather  impetuously. 

Mr.  Brooke  threw  his  head  and  shoulders  back- 
ward as  if  some  one  had  thrown  a  light  missile  at 
him.  Dorothea  immediately  felt  some  self-rebuke, 
and  said,  — 

"  I  mean  in  the  light  of  a  husband.  He  is  very 
kind,  I  think,  —  really  very  good  about  the  cottages. 
A  well-meaning  man." 

"  But  you  must  have  a  scholar,  and  that  sort  of 
thing  ?  Well,  it  lies  a  little  in  our  family.  I  had 
it  myself,  —  that  love  of  knowledge,  and  going  into 
everything,  —  a  little  too  much,  —  it  took  me  too 
far ;  though  that  sort  of  thing  does  n't  often  run  in 
the  female  line ;  or  it  runs  underground  like  the 
rivers  in  Greece,  you  know,  —  it  comes  out  in  the 
sons.  Clever  sons,  clever  mothers.  I  went  a  good 
deal  into  that,  at  one  time.  However,  my  dear,  I 
have  always  said  that  people  should  do  as  they  like 
in  these  things,  up  to  a  certain  point.  I  could  n't, 
as  your  guardian,  have  consented  to  a  bad  match. 
But  Casaubon  stands  well :  his  position  is  good.  I 
am  afraid  Chettam  will  be  hurt,  though,  and  Mrs. 
Cadwallader  will  blame  me." 

That  evening,  of  course,  Celia  knew  nothing  of 
what  had  happened.  She  attributed  Dorothea's 
abstracted  manner,  and  the  evidence  of  further  cry- 
ing since  they  had  got  home,  to  the  temper  she  had 
been  in  about  Sir  James  Chettam  and  the  buildings, 
and  was  careful  not  to  give  further  offence  :  having 
once  said  what  she  wanted  to  say,  Celia  had  no  dis- 


MISS  BROOKE.  59 

position  to  recur  to  disagreeable  subjects.  It  had 
been  her  nature  when  a  child  never  to  quarrel  with 
any  one,  —  only  to  observe  with  wonder  that  they 
quarrelled  with  her,  and  looked  like  turkey-cocks ; 
whereupon  she  was  ready  to  play  at  cat's  cradle 
with  them  whenever  they  recovered  themselves. 
And  as  to  Dorothea,  it  had  always  been  her  way  to 
find  something  wrong  in  her  sister's  words,  though 
Celia  inwardly  protested  that  she  always  said  just 
how  things  were,  and  nothing  else :  she  never  did 
and  never  could  put  words  together  out  of  her  own 
head.  But  the  best  of  Dodo  was,  that  she  did  not 
keep  angry  for  long  together.  Now,  though  they 
had  hardly  spoken  to  each  other  all  the  evening, 
yet  when  Celia  put  by  her  work,  intending  to  go  to 
bed,  a  proceeding  in  which  she  was  always  much 
the  earlier,  Dorothea,  who  was  seated  on  a  low  stool, 
unable  to  occupy  herself  except  in  meditation,  said 
with  the  musical  intonation  which  in  moments  of 
deep  but  quiet  feeling  made  her  speech  like  a  fine 
bit  of  recitative,  — 

"  Celia,  dear,  come  and  kiss  me,"  holding  her  arms 
open  as  she  spoke. 

Celia  knelt  down  to  get  the  right  level  and  gave 
her  little  butterfly  kiss,  while  Dorothea  encircled 
her  with  gentle  arms,  and  pressed  her  lips  gravely  on 
each  cheek  in  turn. 

"  Don't  sit  up,  Dodo,  you  are  so  pale  to-night :  go 
to  bed  soon,"  said  Celia,  in  a  comfortable  way,  with- 
out any  touch  of  pathos. 

"  No,  dear,  I  am  very,  very  happy,"  said  Dorothea, 
fervently. 

"  So  much  the  better,"  thought  Celia.  "  But  how 
strangely  Dodo  goes  from  one  extreme  to  the  other ! " 

The  next  day,  at  luncheon,  the  butler,   handing 


60  MIDDLEMARCH. 

something  to  Mr.  Brooke,  said,  "  Jonas  is  come  back, 
sir,  and  has  brought  this  letter." 

Mr.  Brooke  read  the  letter,  and  then,  nodding 
toward  Dorothea,  said,  "Casaubon,  my  dear:  he 
will  be  here  to  dinner;  he  didn't  wait  to  write 
more,  —  didn't  wait,  you  know." 

It  could  not  seem  remarkable  to  Celia  that  a 
dinner  guest  should  be  announced  to  her  sister 
beforehand,  but,  her  eyes  following  the  same  direc- 
tion as  her  uncle's,  she  was  struck  with  the  peculiar 
effect  of  the  announcement  on  Dorothea.  It  seemed 
as  if  something  like  the  reflection  of  a  white  sunlit 
wing  had  passed  across  her  features,  ending  in  one 
of  her  rare  blushes.  For  the  first  time  it  entered 
into  Celia's  mind  that  there  might  be  something 
more  between  Mr.  Casaubon  and  her  sister  than 
his  delight  in  bookish  talk  and  her  delight  in  listen- 
ing. Hitherto  she  had  classed  the  admiration  for 
this  "ugly"  and  learned  acquaintance  with  the 
admiration  for  Monsieur  Liret  at  Lausanne,  also 
ugly  and  learned.  Dorothea  had  never  been  tired 
of  listening  to  old  Monsieur  Liret  when  Celia's  feet 
were  as  cold  as  possible,  and  when  it  had  really 
become  dreadful  to  see  the  skin  of  his  bald  head 
moving  about.  Why  then  should  her  enthusiasm 
not  extend  to  Mr.  Casaubon  simply  in  the  same 
way  as  to  Monsieur  Liret  ?  And  it  seemed  probable 
that  all  learned  men  had  a  sort  of  schoolmaster's 
view  of  young  people. 

But  now  Celia  was  really  startled  at  the  suspicion 
which  had  darted  into  her  mind.  She  was  seldom 
taken  by  surprise  in  this  way,  her  marvellous  quick- 
ness in  observing  a  certain  order  of  signs  generally 
preparing  her  to  expect  such  outward  events  as  she 
had  an  interest  in.  Not  that  she  now  imagined  Mr. 


MISS  BROOKE.  61 

Casaubon  to  be  already  an  accepted  lover :  she  had 
only  begun  to  feel  disgust  at  the  possibility  that  any- 
thing in  Dorothea's  mind  could  tend  towards  such  an 
issue.  Here  was  something  really  to  vex  her  about 
Dodo :  it  was  all  very  well  not  to  accept  Sir  James 
Chettam,  but  the  idea  of  marrying  Mr.  Casaubon ! 
Celia  felt  a  sort  of  shame  mingled  with  a  sense  of 
the  ludicrous.  But  perhaps  Dodo,  if  she  were  really 
bordering  on  such  an  extravagance,  might  be  turned 
away  from  it :  experience  had  often  shown  that  her 
impressibility  might  be  calculated  on.  The  day  was 
damp,  and  they  were  not  going  to  walk  out,  so  they 
both  went  up  to  their  sitting-room  ;  and  there  Celia 
observed  that  Dorothea,  instead  of  settling  down 
with  her  usual  diligent  interest  to  some  occupation, 
simply  leaned  her  elbow  on  an  open  book  and  looked 
out  of  the  window  at  the  great  cedar  silvered  with 
the  damp.  She  herself  had  taken  up  the  making  of 
a  toy  for  the  curate's  children,  and  was  not  going  to 
enter  on  any  subject  too  precipitately. 

Dorothea  was  in  fact  thinking  that  it  was  desir- 
able for  Celia  to  know  of  the  momentous  change  in 
Mr.  Casaubon's  position  since  he  had  last  been  in 
the  house :  it  did  not  seem  fair  to  leave  her  in  igno- 
rance of  what  would  necessarily  affect  her  attitude 
towards  him ;  but  it  was  impossible  not  to  shrink 
from  telling  her.  Dorothea  accused  herself  of  some 
meanness  in  this  timidity :  it  was  always  odious  to 
her  to  have  any  small  fears  or  contrivances  about 
her  actions,  but  at  this  moment  she  was  seeking  the 
highest  aid  possible  that  she  might  not  dread  the 
corrosiveness  of  Celia's  pretty  carnally  minded  prose. 
Her  reverie  was  broken,  and  the  difficulty  of  decision 
banished,  by  Celia's  small  and  rather  guttural  voice 
speaking  in  its  usual  tone,  of  a  remark  aside  or  a 
"by  the  by." 


62  MIDDLEMARCII. 

"  Is  any  one  else  coming  to  dine  besides  Mr. 
Casaubon  ? " 

"  Not  that  I  know  of." 

"  I  hope  there  is  some  one  else.  Then  I  shall  not 
hear  him  eat  his  soup  so." 

"  What  is  there  remarkable  about  his  soup-eating? " 

"  Really,  Dodo,  can't  you  hear  how  he  scrapes  his 
spoon  ?  And  he  always  blinks  before  he  speaks. 
I  don't  know  whether  Locke  blinked,  but  I  'm  sure 
I  am  sorry  for  those  who  sat  opposite  to  him  if  he 
did." 

"  Celia,"  said  Dorothea,  with  emphatic  gravity, 
"pray  don't  make  any  more  observations  of  that 
kind." 

"Why  not?  They  are  quite  true,"  returned 
Celia,  who  had  her  reasons  for  persevering,  though 
she  was  beginning  to  be  a  little  afraid. 

"  Many  things  are  true  which  only  the  commonest 
minds  observe." 

"Then  I  think  the  commonest  minds  must  be  rather 
useful.  I  think  it  is  a  pity  Mr.  Casaubon's  mother 
had  not  a  commoner  mind :  she  might  have  taught 
him  better."  Celia  was  inwardly  frightened,  and 
ready  to  run  away,  now  she  had  hurled  this  light 
javelin. 

Dorothea's  feelings  had  gathered  to  an  avalanche, 
and  there  could  be  no  further  preparation. 

"  It  is  right  to  tell  you,  Celia,  that  I  am  engaged 
to  marry  Mr.  Casaubon." 

Perhaps  Celia  had  never  turned  so  pale  before. 
The  paper  man  she  was  making  would  have  had 
his  leg  injured,  but  for  her  habitual  care  of  what- 
ever she  held  in  her  hands.  She  laid  the  fragile 
figure  down  at  once,  and  sat  perfectly  still  for  a 
few  moments.  When  she  spoke  there  was  a  tear 
gathering. 


MISS  BROOKE.  63 

"  Oh,  Dodo,  I  hope  you  will  be  happy."  Her 
sisterly  tenderness  could  not  but  surmount  other 
feelings  at  this  moment,  and  her  fears  were  the 
fears  of  affection. 

Dorothea  was  still  hurt  and  agitated. 

"  It  is  quite  decided,  then  ? "  said  Celia,  in  an 
awed  undertone.  "  And  uncle  knows  ?  " 

"  I  have  accepted  Mr.  Casaubon's  offer.  My  uncle 
brought  me  the  letter  that  contained  it;  he  knew 
about  it  beforehand." 

"I  beg  your  pardon  if  I  have  said  anything  to 
hurt  you,  Dodo,"  said  Celia,  with  a  slight  sob.  She 
never  could  have  thought  that  she  should  feel  as 
she  did.  There  was  something  funereal  in  the  whole 
affair,  and  Mr.  Casaubon  seemed  to  be  the  officiating 
clergyman,  about  whom  it  would  be  indecent  to 
make  remarks. 

"  Never  mind,  Kitty,  do  not  grieve.  We  should 
never  admire  the  same  people.  I  often  offend  in 
something  of  the  same  way ;  I  am  apt  to  speak  too 
strongly  of  those  who  don't  please  me." 

In  spite  of  this  magnanimity  Dorothea  was  still 
smarting :  perhaps  as  much  from  Celia's  subdued 
astonishment  as  from  her  small  criticisms.  Of 
course  all  the  world  round  Tipton  would  be  out 
of  sympathy  with  this  marriage.  Dorothea  knew 
of  no  one  who  thought  as  she  did  about  life  and  its 
best  objects. 

Nevertheless  before  the  evening  was  at  an  end 
she  was  very  happy.  In  an  hour's  tete-a-tete  with 
Mr.  Casaubon  she  talked  to  him  with  more  freedom 
than  she  had  ever  felt  before,  even  pouring  out  her 
joy  at  the  thought  of  devoting  herself  to  him,  and 
of  learning  how  she  might  best  share  and  further 
all  his  great  ends.  Mr.  Casaubon  was  touched  with 


64  MIDDLEMARCH. 

an  unknown  delight  (what  man  would  not  have 
been?)  at  this  childlike  unrestrained  ardour;  he 
was  not  surprised  (what  lover  would  have  been  ?) 
that  he  should  be  the  object  of  it. 

"  My  dear  young  lady ,  —  Miss  Brooke,  —  Doro- 
thea ! "  he  said,  pressing  her  hand  between  his 
hands,  "  this  is  a  happiness  greater  than  I  had  ever 
imagined  to  be  in  reserve  for  me.  That  I  should 
ever  meet  with  a  mind  and  person  so  rich  in  the 
mingled  graces  which  could  render  marriage  desir- 
able, was  far  indeed  from  my  conception.  You  have 
all  —  nay,  more  than  all  —  those  qualities  which  I 
have  ever  regarded  as  the  characteristic  excellences 
of  womanhood.  The  great  charm  of  your  sex  is  its 
capability  of  an  ardent  self-sacrificing  affection,  and 
herein  we  see  its  fitness  to  round  and  complete  the 
existence  of  our  own.  Hitherto  I  have  known 
few  pleasures  save  of  the  severer  kind :  my  satis- 
factions have  been  those  of  the  solitary  student.  I 
have  been  little  disposed  to  gather  flowers  that 
would  wither  in  my  hand,  but  now  I  shall  pluck 
them  with  eagerness,  to  place  them  in  your  bosom." 

No  speech  could  have  been  more  thoroughly  hon- 
est in  its  intention  :  the  frigid  rhetoric  at  the  end 
was  as  sincere  as  the  bark  of  a  dog,  or  the  cawing 
of  an  amorous  rook.  Would  it  not  be  rash  to  con- 
clude that  there  was  no  passion  behind  those  son- 
nets to  Delia  which  strike  us  as  the  thin  music  of 
a  mandolin  ? 

Dorothea's  faith  supplied  all  that  Mr.  Casau- 
bon's  words  seemed  to  leave  unsaid :  what  believer 
sees  a  disturbing  omission  or  infelicity  ?  The  text, 
whether  of  prophet  or  of  poet,  expands  for  whatever 
we  can  put  into  it,  and  even  his  bad  grammar  is 
sublime. 


MR.  CASAUBON  AND  DOROTHEA. 


MISS  BROOKE.  65 

"  I  am  very  ignorant,  —  you  will  quite  wonder  at 
my  ignorance,"  said  Dorothea.  "I  have  so  many 
thoughts  that  may  be  quite  mistaken ;  and  now  I 
shall  be  able  to  tell  them  all  to  you,  and  ask  you 
about  them.  But,"  she  added,  with  rapid  imagination 
of  Mr.  Casaubon's  probable  feeling, "  I  will  not  trouble 
you  too  much ;  only  when  you  are  inclined  to  listen 
to  me.  You  must  often  be  weary  with  the  pursuit 
of  subjects  in  your  own  track.  I  shall  gain  enough 
if  you  will  take  me  with  you  there." 

"  How  should  I  be  able  now  to  persevere  in  any 
path  without  your  companionship  ?  "  said  Mr.  Casau- 
bon,  kissing  her  candid  brow,  and  feeling  that 
heaven  had  vouchsafed  him  a  blessing  in  every  way 
suited  to  his  peculiar  wants.  He  was  being  uncon- 
sciously wrought  upon  by  the  charms  of  a  nature 
which  was  entirely  without  hidden  calculations 
either  for  immediate  effects  or  for  remoter  ends.  It 
was  this  which  made  Dorothea  so  childlike,  and, 
according  to  some  judges,  so  stupid,  with  all  her 
reputed  cleverness  ;  as,  for  example,  in  the  present 
case  of  throwing  herself,  metaphorically  speaking,  at 
Mr.  Casaubon's  feet,  and  kissing  his  unfashionable 
shoe-ties  as  if  he  were  a  Protestant  Pope.  She  was 
not  in  the  least  teaching  Mr.  Casaubon  to  ask  if  he 
were  good  enough  for  her,  but  merely  asking  herself 
anxiously  how  she  could  be  good  enough  for  Mr. 
Casaubon.  Before  he  left  the  next  day  it  had  been 
decided  that  the  marriage  should  take  place  within 
six  weeks.  Why  not  ?  Mr.  Casaubon's  house  was 
ready.  It  was  not  a  parsonage,  but  a  considerable 
mansion,  with  much  land  attached  to  it.  The  par- 
sonage was  inhabited  by  the  curate,  who  did  all  the 
duty  except  preaching  the  morning  sermon. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

"  My  lady's  tongue  is  like  the  meadow  blade?, 
That  cut  you  stroking  them  with  idle  hand. 
Nice  cutting  is  her  function  :  she  divides 
With  spiritual  edge  the  millet-seed, 
And  makes  intangible  savings." 

As  Mr.  Casaubon's  carriage  was  passing  out  of  the 
gateway,  it  arrested  the  entrance  of  a  pony  phaeton 
driven  by  a  lady  with  a  servant  seated  behind.  It 
was  doubtful  whether  the  recognition  had  been 
mutual,  for  Mr.  Casaubon  was  looking  absently  be- 
fore him;  but  the  lady  was  quick -eyed,  and  threw 
a  nod  and  a  "  How  do  you  do  ? "  in  the  nick  of  time. 
In  spite  of  her  shabby  bonnet  and  very  old  Indian 
shawl,  it  was  plain  that  the  lodge-keeper  regarded 
her  as  an  important  personage,  from  the  low  courtesy 
which  was  dropped  on  the  entrance  of  the  small 
phaeton. 

"  Well,  Mrs.  Fitchett,  how  are  your  fowls  laying 
now  ? "  said  the  high-coloured,  dark-eyed  lady,  with 
the  clearest  chiselled  utterance. 

"  Pretty  well  for  laying,  madam,  but  they  Ve  ta'en 
to  eating  their  eggs :  I  Ve  no  peace  o'  mind  with 
'em  at  all." 

"  Oh,  the  cannibals  !  Better  sell  them  cheap  at 
once.  What  will  you  sell  them  a  couple  ?  One 
can't  eat  fowls  of  a  bad  character  at  a  high  price." 

"  Well,  madam,  half-a-crown :  I  could  n't  let  'em 
go,  not  under." 


MISS  BROOKE.  67 

"  Half-a-crown,  these  times  !  Come  now,  —  for 
the  Eector's  chicken-broth  on  a  Sunday.  He  has 
consumed  all  ours  that  I  can  spare.  You  are  half 
paid  with  the  sermon,  Mrs.  Fitchett,  remember  that. 
Take  a  pair  of  tumbler  pigeons  for  them,  —  little 
beauties.  You  must  come  and  see  them.  You 
have  no  tumblers  among  your  pigeons." 

"  Well,  madam,  Master  Fitchett  shall  go  and  see 
'em  after  work.  He 's  very  hot  on  new  sorts ;  to 
oblige  you." 

"  Oblige  me  !  It  will  be  the  best  bargain  he  ever 
made.  A  pair  of  church  pigeons  for  a  couple  of 
wicked  Spanish  fowls  that  eat  their  own  eggs  ! 
Don't  you  and  Fitchett  boast  too  much,  that  is 
all !  " 

The  phaeton  was  driven  onwards  with  the  last  words, 
leaving  Mrs.  Fitchett  laughing  and  shaking  her  head 
slowly,  with  an  interjectional  "  Surety,  sure/y  /"• 
from  which  it  might  be  inferred  that  she  would  have 
found  the  country-side  somewhat  duller  if  the  Rec- 
tor's lady  had  been  less  free-spoken  and  less  of  a 
skinflint.  Indeed,  both  the  farmers  and  labourers 
in  the  parishes  of  Freshitt  and  Tipton  would  have 
felt  a  sad  lack  of  conversation  but  for  the  stories 
about  what  Mrs.  Cadwallader  said  and  did :  a  lady 
of  immeasurably  high  birth,  descended  as  it  were 
from  unknown  earls,  dim  as  the  crowd  of  heroic 
shades,  —  who  pleaded  poverty,  pared  down  prices, 
and  cut  jokes  in  the  most  companionable  manner, 
though  with  a  turn  of  tongue  that  let  you  know 
who  she  was.  Such  a  lady  gave  a  neighbourliness  to 
both  rank  and  religion,  and  mitigated  the  bitterness 
of  uncommuted  tithe.  A  much  more  exemplary 
character  with  an  infusion  of  sour  dignity  would 
not  have  furthered  their  comprehension  of  the 


68  MIDDLEMARCH. 

Thirty-nine  Articles,  and  would  have  been  less 
socially  uniting. 

Mr.  Brooke,  seeing  Mrs.  Cadwallader's  merits 
from  a  different  point  of  view,  winced  a  little  when 
her  name  was  announced  in  the  library,  where  he 
was  sitting  alone. 

"  I  see  you  have  had  our  Lowick  Cicero  here,"  she 
said,  seating  herself  comfortably,  throwing  back  her 
wraps,  and  showing  a  thin  but  well-built  figure. 
"  I  suspect  you  and  he  are  brewing  some  bad  poli- 
tics, else  you  would  not  be  seeing  so  much  of  the 
lively  man.  I  shall  inform  against  you :  remem- 
ber you  are  both  suspicious  characters  since  you 
took  Peel's  side  about  the  Catholic  Bill.  I  shall 
tell  everybody  that  you  are  going  to  put  up  for 
Middlemarch  on  the  .Whig  side  when  old  Pinker- 
ton  resigns,  and  that  Casaubon  is  going  to  help 
you  in  an  underhand  manner :  going  to  bribe  the 
voters  with  pamphlets,  and  throw  open  the  public- 
houses  to  distribute  them.  Come,  confess  ! " 

"  Nothing  of  the  sort,"  said  Mr.  Brooke,  smiling 
and  rubbing  his  eye-glasses,  but  really  blushing  a 
little  at  the  impeachment.  "  Casaubon  and  I  don't 
talk  politics  much.  He  does  n't  care  much  about 
the  philanthropic  side  of  things  ;  punishments,  and 
that  kind  of  thing.  He  only  cares  about  Church 
questions.  That  is  not  my  line  of  action,  you 
know/' 

"  Ra-a-ther  too  much,  my  friend.  /  have  heard  of 
your  doings.  Who  was  it  that  sold  his  bit  of  land 
to  the  Papists  at  Middlemarch  ?  I  believe  you 
bought  it  on  purpose.  You  are  a  perfect  Guy 
Fawkes.  See  if  you  are  not  burnt  in  effigy  this  5th 
of  November  coming.  Humphrey  would  not  come 
to  quarrel  with  you  about  it,  so  I  am  come." 


MISS  BROOKE.  69 

"  Very  good.  I  was  prepared  to  be  persecuted 
for  not  persecuting,  —  not  persecuting,  you  know." 

"  There  you  go  !  That  is  a  piece  of  clap-trap 
you  have  got  ready  for  the  hustings.  Now,  do  not  let 
them  lure  you  to  the  hustings,  my  dear  Mr.  Brooke. 
A  man  always  makes  a  fool  of  himself,  speechify- 
ing :  there  's  no  excuse  but  being  on  the  right  side, 
so  that  you  can  ask  a  blessing  on  your  humming 
and  hawing.  You  will  lose  yourself,  I  forewarn 
you.  You  will  make  a  Saturday  pie  of  all  parties' 
opinions,  and  be  pelted  by  everybody." 

"  That  is  what  I  expect,  you  know,"  said  Mr. 
Brooke,  not  wishing  to  betray  how  little  he  enjoyed 
this  prophetic  sketch,  —  "  what  I  expect  as  an  inde- 
pendent man.  As  to  the  Whigs,  a  man  who  goes 
with  the  thinkers  is  not  likely  to  be  hooked  on  by 
any  party.  He  may  go  with  them  up  to  a  certain 
point,  —  up  to  a  certain  point,  you  know.  But  that 
is  what  you  ladies  never  understand." 

"  Where  your  certain  point  is  ?  No.  I  should 
like  to  be  told  how  a  man  can  have  any  certain 
point  when  he  belongs  to  no  party,  —  leading  a  rov- 
ing life,  and  never  letting  his  friends  know  his 
address.  '  Nobody  knows  where  Brooke  will  be,  — 
there's  no  counting  on  Brooke,'  —  that  is  what 
people  say  of  you,  to  be  quite  frank.  Now,  do  turn 
respectable.  How  will  you  like  going  to  Sessions 
with  everybody  looking  shy  on  you,  and  you  with 
a  bad  conscience  arid  an  empty  pocket?" 

"  I  don't  pretend  to  argue  with  a  lady  on  poli- 
tics," said  Mr.  Brooke,  with  an  air  of  smiling 
indifference,  but  feeling  rather  unpleasantly  con- 
scious that  this  attack  of  Mrs.  Cadwallader's  had 
opened  the  defensive  campaign  to  which  certain 
rash  steps  had  exposed  him.  "  Your  sex  are  not 


70  MIDDLEMA.RCH. 

thinkers,  you  know,  —  varium  et  mutabile  semper, 
-  that  kind  of  thing.  You  don't  know  Virgil.  I 
knew  "  -  Mr.  Brooke  reflected  in  time  that  he  had 
not  had  the  personal  acquaintance  of  the  Augustan 
poet  —  "I  was  going  to  say,  poor  Stoddart,  you 
know.  That  was  what  he  said.  You  ladies  are 
always  against  an  independent  attitude,  —  a  man's 
caring  for  nothing  but  truth,  and  that  sort  of  thing. 
And  there  is  no  part  of  the  county  where  opinion  is 
narrower  than  it  is  here,  —  I  don't  mean  to  throw 
stones,  you  know,  but  somebody  is  wanted  to  take 
the  independent  line ;  and  if  I  don't  take  it,  who 
will?" 

"  Who  ?  Why,  any  upstart  who  has  got  neither 
blood  nor  position.  People  of  standing  should 
consume  their  independent  nonsense  at  home,  not 
hawk  it  about.  And  you  !  who  are  going  to  marry 
your  niece,  as  good  as  your  daughter,  to  one  of  our 
best  men.  Sir  James  would  be  cruelly  annoyed :  it 
will  be  too  hard  on  him  if  you  turn  round  now  and 
make  yourself  a  Whig  sign-board." 

Mr.  Brooke  again  winced  inwardly,  for  Dorothea's 
engagement  had  no  sooner  been  decided  than  he 
had  thought  of  Mrs.  Cadwallader's  prospective 
taunts.  It  might  have  been  easy  for  ignorant 
observers  to  say,  "  Quarrel  with  Mrs.  Cadwalla- 
der ; "  but  where  is  a  country  gentleman  to  go 
who  quarrels  with  his  oldest  neighbours  ?  Who 
could  taste  the  fine  flavour  in  the  name  of  Brooke 
if  it  were  delivered  casually,  like  wine  without  a 
seal  ?  Certainly  a  man  can  only  be  cosmopolitan 
up  to  a  certain  point. 

"  I  hope  Chettam  and  I  shall  always  be  good 
friends ;  but  I  am  sorry  to  say  there  is  no  pros- 
pect of  his  marrying  my  niece,"  said  Mr.  Brooke, 


MISS  BROOKE.  71 

much   relieved   to   see   through   the   window   that 
Celia  was  coming  in. 

"  Why  not  ?  "  said  Mrs.  Cadwallader,  with  a  sharp 
note  of  surprise.  "  It  is  hardly  a  fortnight  since 
you  and  I  were  talking  about  it." 

"  My  niece  has  chosen  another  suitor,  —  has  chosen 
him,  you  know.  I  have  had  nothing  to  do  with  it. 
I  should  have  preferred  Chettanl ;  and  I  should  have 
said  Chettam  was  the  man  any  girl  would  have 
chosen.  But  there  is  no  accounting  for  these 
things.  Your  sex  is  capricious,  you  know." 

"Why,  whom  do  you  mean  to  say  that  you  are 
going  to  let  her  marry  ? "  Mrs.  Cadwallader's 
mind  was  rapidly  surveying  the  possibilities  of 
choice  for  Dorothea. 

But  here  Celia  entered,  blooming  from  a  walk 
in  the  garden,  and  the  greeting  with  her  delivered 
Mr.  Brooke  from  the  necessity  of  answering  imme- 
diately. He  got  up  hastily,  and  saying,  "  By  the 
way,  I  must  speak  to  Wright  about  the  horses," 
shuffled  quickly  out  of  the  room. 

"  My  dear  child,  what  is  this  ?  —  this  about  your 
sister's  engagement  ? "  said  Mrs.  Cadwallader. 

"She  is  engaged  to  marry  Mr.  Casaubon,"  said 
Celia,  resorting,  as  usual,  to  the  simplest  statement 
of  fact,  and  enjoying  this  opportunity  of  speaking 
to  the  Sector's  wife  alone. 

"  This  is  frightful.  How  long  has  it  been  going 
on?" 

"I  only  knew  of  it  yesterday.  They  are  to  be 
married  in  six  weeks." 

"  Well,  my  dear,  I  wish  you  joy  of  your  brother- 
in-law." 

"I  am  so  sorry  for  Dorothea." 

"  Sorry  !     It  is  her  doing,  I  suppose." 


72  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  Yes ;  she  says  Mr.  Casaubbn  has  a  great  soul." 

"With  all  my  heart."' 

"  Oh,  Mrs.  Cadwallader,  I  don't  think  it  can  be 
nice  to  marry  a  man  with  a  great  soul." 

"  Well,  my  dear,  take  warning.  You  know  the 
look  of  one  now ;  when  the  next  comes  and  wants 
to  marry  you,  don't  you  accept  him." 

"I'm  sure  I  never  should." 

"  No ;  one  such  in  a  family  is  enough.  So  your 
sister  never  cared  about  Sir  James  Chettam  ?  What 
would  you  have  said  to  him  for  a  brother-in-law  ?  " 

"  I  should  have  liked  that  very  much.  I  am  sure 
he  would  have  been  a  good  husband.  Only,"  Celia 
added,  with  a  slight  blush  (she  sometimes  seemed  to 
blush  as  she  breathed),  "  I  don't  think  he  would 
have  suited  Dorothea." 

"  Not  high-flown  enough  ?  " 

"  Dodo  is  very  strict.  She  thinks  so  much  about 
everything,  and  is  so  particular  about  what  one  says. 
Sir  James  never  seemed  to  please  her." 

"She  must  have  encouraged  him,  I  am  sure. 
That  is  not  very  creditable." 

"  Please  don't  be  angry  with  Dodo  ;  she  does  not 
see  things.  She  thought  so  much  about  the  cottages, 
and  she  was  rude  to  Sir  James  sometimes ;  but  he  is 
so  kind,  he  never  noticed  it." 

"  Well,"  said  Mrs.  Cadwallader,  putting  on  her 
shawl,  and  rising,  as  if  in  haste,  "  I  must  go  straight 
to  Sir  James  and  break  this  to  him.  He  will  have 
brought  his  mother  back  by  this  time,  and  I  must 
call.  Your  uncle  will  never  tell  him.  We  are  all 
disappointed,  my  dear.  Young  people  should  think 
of  their  families  in  marrying.  I  set  a  bad  example, 
• —  married  a  poor  clergyman,  and  made  myself  a 
pitiable  object  among  the  De  Bracys,  —  obliged 


MISS  BROOKE.  73 

to  get  my  coals  by  stratagem,  and  pray  to  heaven 
for  my  salad  oil.  However,  Casaubon  bas  money 
enough ;  I  must  do  him  that  justice.  As  to  his 
blood,  I  suppose  the  family  quarterings  are  three 
cuttle-fish  sable,  and  a  commentator  rampant.  By 
the  by,  before  I  go,  my  dear,  I  must  speak  to  your 
Mrs.  Carter  about  pastry.  I  want  to  send  my  young 
cook  to  learn  of  her.  Poor  people  with  four  children, 
like  us,  you  know,  can't  afford  to  keep  a  good  cook. 
I  have  no  doubt  Mrs.  Carter  will  oblige  me.  Sir 
James's  cook  is  a  perfect  dragon." 

In  less  than  an  hour  Mrs.  Cadwallader  had  cir- 
cumvented Mrs.  Carter  and  driven  to  Freshitt  Hall, 
which  was  not  far  from  her  own  parsonage,  her  hus- 
band being  resident  in  Freshitt  and  keeping  a  curate 
in  Tipton. 

Sir  James  Chettam  had  returned  from  the  short 
journey  which  had  kept  him  absent  for  a  couple  of 
days,  and  had  changed  his  dress,  intending  to  ride 
over  to  Tipton  Grange.  His  horse  was  standing  at 
the  door  when  Mrs.  Cadwallader  drove  up,  and  he 
immediately  appeared  there  himself,  whip  in  hand. 
Lady  Chettam  had  not  yet  returned,  but  Mrs.  Cad- 
wallader's  errand  could  not  be  despatched  in  the 
presence  of  grooms,  so  she  asked  to  be  taken  into 
the  conservatory  close  by,  to  look  at  the  new  plants ; 
and  on  coming  to  a  contemplative  stand  she  said,  — 

"  I  have  a  great  shock  for  you ;  I  hope  you  are 
not  so  far  gone  in  love  as  you  pretended  to  be." 

It  was  of  no  use  protesting  against  Mrs.  Cadwal- 
lader's  way  of  putting  things.  But  Sir  James's 
countenance  changed  a  little.  He  felt  a  vague 
alarm. 

"I  do  believe  Brooke  is  going  to  expose  himself 
after  all.  I  accused  him  of  meaning  to  stand  for 


74  MIDDLEMARCH. 

Middlemarch  on  the  Liberal  side,  and  he  looked 
silly  and  never  denied  it,  —  talked  about  the  inde- 
pendent line  and  the  usual  nonsense." 

"  Is  that  all  ?  "  said  Sir  James,  much  relieved. 

"  Why,"  rejoined  Mrs.  Cadwallader,  with  a  sharper 
note,  "  you  don't  mean  to  say  that  you  would  like 
him  to  turn  public  man  in  that  way,  —  making  a 
sort  of  political  Cheap  Jack  of  himself  ? " 

"  He  might  be  dissuaded,  I  should  think.  He 
would  not  like  the  expense." 

"  That  is  what  I  told  him.  He  is  vulnerable  to 
reason  there,  —  always  a  few  grains  of  common- 
sense  in  an  ounce  of  miserliness.  Miserliness  is  a 
capital  quality  to  run  in  families  ;  it 's  the  safe  side 
for  madness  to  dip  on.  And  there  must  be  a  little 
crack  in  the  Brooke  family,  else  we  should  not  see 
what  we  are  to  see." 

"  What  ?     Brooke  standing  for  Middlemarch  ? " 

"  Worse  than  that.  I  really  feel  a  little  respon- 
sible. I  always  told  you  Miss  Brooke  would  be 
such  a  fine  match.  I  knew  there  was  a  great  deal 
of  nonsense  in  her,  —  a  flighty  sort  of  Methodistical 
stuff.  But  these  things  wear  out  of  girls.  How- 
ever, I  am  taken  by  surprise  for  once." 

"  What  do  you  mean,  Mrs.  Cadwallader  ? "  said 
Sir  James.  His  fear  lest  Miss  Brooke  should  have 
run  away  to  join  the  Moravian  Brethren,  or  some 
preposterous  sect  unknown  to  good  society,  was  a 
little  allayed  by  the  knowledge  that  Mrs.  Cadwal- 
lader always  made  the  worst  of  things.  "  What  has 
happened  to  Miss  Brooke  ?  Pray  speak  out." 

"  Very  well.  She  is  engaged  to  be  married." 
Mrs.  Cadwallader  paused  a  few  moments,  observing 
the  deeply  hurt  expression  in  her  friend's  face, 
which  he  was  trying  to  conceal  by  a  nervous  smile, 


MISS  BROOKE.  75 

while  he  whipped  his  boot;  but  she  soon  added, 
"  Engaged  to  Casaubon." 

Sir  James  let  his  whip  fall  and  stooped  to  pick  it 
up.  Perhaps  his  face  had  never  before  gathered  so 
much  concentrated  disgust  as  when  he  turned  to 
Mrs.  Cadwallader  and  repeated,  "Casaubon?" 

"  Even  so.     You  know  my  errand  now." 

"  Good  God  !  It  is  horrible !  He  is  no  better  than 
a  murnmy  ! "  (The  point  of  view  has  to  be  allowed 
for,  as  that  of  a  blooming  and  disappointed  rival.) 

"  She  says  he  is  a  great  soul.  —  A  great  bladder 
for  dried  peas  to  rattle  in  ! "  said  Mrs.  Cadwallader. 

"  What  business  has  an  old  bachelor  like  that  to 
marry  ?  "  said  Sir  James.  "He  has  one  foot  in  the 
grave." 

"  He  means  to  draw  it  out  again,  I  suppose." 

"  Brooke  ought  not  to  allow  it :  he  should  insist 
on  its  being  put  off  till  she  is  of  age.  She  would 
think  better  of  it  then.  What  is  a  guardian  for  ? " 

"  As  if  you  could  ever  squeeze  a  resolution  out  of 
Brooke ! " 

"Cadwallader  might  talk  to  him." 

"  Not  he  !  Humphrey  finds  everybody  charming. 
I  never  can  get  him  to  abuse  Casaubon.  He  will 
even  speak  well  of  the  bishop,  though  I  tell  him  it 
is  unnatural  in  a  beneficed  clergyman  ;  what  can  one 
do  with  a  husband  who  attends  so  little  to  the 
decencies  ?  I  hide  it  as  well  as  I  can  by  abusing 
everybody  myself.  Come,  come,  cheer  up !  you  are 
well  rid  of  Miss  Brooke,  a  girl  who  would  have 
been  requiring  you  to  see  the  stars  by  daylight. 
Between  ourselves,  little  Celia  is  worth  two  of  her, 
and  likely,  after  all,  to  be  the  better  match.  For 
this  marriage  to  Casaubon  is  as  good  as  going  to  a 
nunnery." 


76  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  Oh,  on  my  own  account  —  it  is  for  Miss  Brooke's 
sake  I  think  her  friends  should  try  to  use  their 
influence." 

"  Well,  Humphrey  does  n't  know  yet.  But  when 
I  tell  him,  you  may  depend  on  it  he  will  say,  '  Why 
not  ?  Casaubon  is  a  good  fellow  —  and  young  — 
young  enough.'  These  charitable  people  never  know 
vinegar  from  wine  till  they  have  swallowed  it  and 
got  the  colic.  However,  if  I  were  a  man  I  should 
prefer  Celia,  especially  when  Dorothea  was  gone. 
The  truth  is,  you  have  been  courting  one  and  have 
won  the  other.  I  can  see  that  she  admires  you 
almost  as  much  as  a  man  expects  to  be  admired. 
If  it  were  any  one  but  me  who  said  so,  you  might 
think  it  exaggeration.  Good-by  ! " 

Sir  James  handed  Mrs.  Cadwallader  to  the  phaeton, 
and  then  jumped  on  his  horse.  He  was  not  going 
to  renounce  his  ride  because  of  his  friend's  un- 
pleasant news,  —  only  to  ride  the  faster  in  some 
other  direction  than  that  of  Tipton  Grange. 

Now,  why  on  earth  should  Mrs.  Cadwallader  have 
been  at  all  busy  about  Miss  Brooke's  marriage ;  and 
why,  when  one  match  that  she  liked  to  think  she 
had  a  hand  in  was  frustrated,  should  she  have 
straightway  contrived  the  preliminaries  of  another  ? 
Was  there  any  ingenious  plot,  any  hide-and-seek 
course  of  action,  which  might  be  detected  by  a 
careful  telescopic  watch  ?  Not  at  all :  a  telescope 
might  have  swept  the  parishes  of  Tipton  and  Freshitt, 
the  whole  area  visited  by  Mrs.  Cadwallader  in  her 
phaeton,  without  witnessing  any  interview  that 
could  excite  suspicion,  or  any  scene  from  which  she 
did  not  return  with  the  same  unperturbed  keenness 
of  eye  and  the  same  high  natural  colour.  In  fact, 
if  that  convenient  vehicle  had  existed  in  the  days 


MISS  BROOKE.  77 

of  the  Seven  Sages,  one  of  them  would  doubtless 
have  remarked  that  you  can  know  little  of  women 
by  following  them  about  in  their  pony-phaetons. 
Even  with  a  microscope  directed  on  a  water-drop 
we  find  ourselves  making  interpretations  which  turn 
out  to  be  rather  coarse ;  for  whereas  under  a  weak 
lens  you  may  seem  to  see  a  creature  exhibiting  an 
active  voracity  into  which  other  smaller  creatures 
actively  play  as  if  they  were  so  many  animated  tax- 
pennies,  a  stronger  lens  reveals  to  you  certain  tiniest 
liairlets  which  make  vortices  for  these  victims  while 
the  swallower  waits  passively  at  his  receipt  of  cus- 
tom. In  this  way,  metaphorically  speaking,  a  strong 
lens  applied  to  Mrs.  Cadwallader's  match-making 
will  show  a  play  of  minute  causes  producing  what 
may  be  called  thought  and  speech  vortices  to  bring 
her  the  sort  of  food  she  needed. 

Her  life  was  rurally  simple,  quite  free  from  secrets 
either  foul,  dangerous,  or  otherwise  important,  and 
not  consciously  affected  by  the  great  affairs  of  the 
world.  All  the  more  did  the  affairs  of  the  great 
world  interest  her,  when  communicated  in  the 
letters  of  high-born  relations  :  the  way  in  which 
fascinating  younger  sons  had  gone  to  the  dogs  by 
marrying  their  mistresses  ;  the  fine  old-blooded  idiocy 
of  young  Lord  Tapir,  arid  the  furious  gouty  humours 
of  old  Lord  Megatherium  ;  the  exact  crossing  of 
genealogies  which  had  brought  a  coronet  into  a  new 
branch  and  widened  the  relations  of  scandal,— 
these  were  topics  of  which  she  retained  details 
with  the  utmost  accuracy,  and  reproduced  them  in 
an  excellent  pickle  of  epigrams,  which  she  herself 
enjoyed  the  more  because  she  believed  as  unques- 
tionably in  birth  and  no-birth  as  she  did  in  game 
and  vermin.  She  would  never  have  disowned  any 


78  MIDDLEMARCII. 

one  on  the  ground  of  poverty :  a  De  Bracy  reduced 
to  take  his  dinner  in  a  basin  would  have  seemed  to 
her  an  example  of  pathos  worth  exaggerating,  and  I 
fear  his  aristocratic  vices  would  not  have  horrified 
her.  But  her  feeling  towards  the  vulgar  rich  was  a 
sort  of  religious  hatred :  they  had  probably  made  all 
their  money  out  of  high  retail  prices,  and  Mrs.  Cad- 
wallader  detested  high  prices  for  everything  that 
was  not  paid  in  kind  at  the  Rectory :  such  people 
were  no  part  of  God's  design  in  making  the  world  ; 
and  their  accent  was  an  affliction  to  the  ears.  A 
town  where  such  monsters  abounded  was  hardly 
more  than  a  sort  of  low  comedy,  which  could  not  be 
taken  account  of  in  a  well-bred  scheme  of  the  uni- 
verse. Let  any  lady  who  is  inclined  to  be  hard  on 
Mrs.  Cadwallader  inquire  into  the  comprehensive- 
ness of  her  own  beautiful  views,  and  be  quite  sure 
that  they  afford  accommodation  for  all  the  lives 
which  have  the  honour  to  coexist  with  hers. 

With  such  a  mind,  active  as  phosphorus,  biting 
everything  that  caine  near  into  the  form  that  suited 
it,  how  could  Mrs.  Cadwallader  feel  that  the  Miss 
Brookes  and  their  matrimonial  prospects  were  alien 
to  her  ?  especially  as  it  had  been  the  habit  of  years 
for  her  to  scold  Mr.  Brooke  with  the  friendliest 
frankness,  and  let  him  know  in  confidence  that 
she  thought  him  a  poor  creature.  From  the  first 
arrival  of  the  young  ladies  in  Tipton  she  had  pre- 
arranged Dorothea's  marriage  with  Sir  James,  and 
if  it  had  taken  place  would  have  been  quite  sure 
that  it  was  her  doing  :  that  it  should  not  take  place 
after  she  had  preconceived  it,  caused  her  an  irrita- 
tion which  every  thinker  will  sympathize  with. 
She  was  the  diplomatist  of  Tipton  and  Freshitt,  and 
for  anything  to  happen  in  spite  of  her  was  an 


MISS  BROOKE.  79 

offensive  irregularity.  As  to  freaks  like  this  of 
Miss  Brooke's,  Mrs.  Cadwallader  had  uo  patience 
with  them,  and  now  saw  that  her  opinion  of  this 
girl  had  been  infected  with  some  of  her  husband's 
weak  charitableness:  those  Methodistical  whims, 
that  air  of  being  more  religious  than  the  rector 
and  curate  together,  came  from  a  deeper  and  more 
constitutional  disease  than  she  had  been  willing 
to  believe. 

"  However,"  said  Mrs.  Cadwallader,  first  to  herself 
and  afterwards  to  her  husband,  "  I  throw  her  over : 
there  was  a  chance,  if  she  had  married  Sir  James, 
of  her  becoming  a  sane,  sensible  woman.  He  would 
never  have  contradicted  her,  and  when  a  woman  is 
not  contradicted,  she  has  no  motive  for  obstinacy  in 
her  absurdities.  But  now  I  wish  her  joy  of  her 
hair  shirt." 

It  followed  that  Mrs.  Cadwallader  must  decide  on 
another  match  for  Sir  James,  and  having  made  up 
her  mind  that  it  was  to  be  the  younger  Miss  Brooke, 
there  could  not  have  been  a  more  skilful  move  to- 
wards the  success  of  her  plan  than  her  hint  to  the 
baronet  that  he  had  made  an  impression  on  Celia's 
heart.  For  he  was  not  one  of  those  gentlemen 
who  languish  after  the  unattainable  Sappho's  apple 
that  laughs  from  the  topmost  bough,  —  the  charms 
which 

"  Smile  like  the  knot  of  cowslips  on  the,  cliff, 
Not  to  be  come  at  by  the  willing  hand." 

He  had  no  sonnets  to  write,  and  it  could  not  strike 
him  agreeably  that  he  was  not  an  object  of  prefer- 
ence to  the  woman  whom  he  had  preferred.  Already 
the  knowledge  that  Dorothea  had  chosen  Mr.  Casau- 
bon  had  bruised  his  attachment  and  relaxed  its  hold. 
Although  Sir  James  was  a  sportsman,  he  had  some 


8o  MIDDLEMARCH. 

other  feelings  towards  women  than  towards  grouse 
and  foxes,  and  did  not  regard  his  future  wife  in  the 
light  of  prey,  valuable  chiefly  for  the  excitements  of 
the  chase.  Neither  was  he  so  well  acquainted  with 
the  habits  of  primitive  races  as  to  feel  that  an 
ideal  combat  for  her,  tomahawk  in  hand,  so  to 
speak,  was  necessary  to  the  historical  continuity 
of  the  marriage-tie.  On  the  contrary,  having  the 
amiable  vanity  which  knits  us  to  those  who  are 
fond  of  us,  and  disinclines  us  to  those  who  are 
indifferent,  and  also  a  good  grateful  nature,  the 
mere  idea  that  a  woman  had  a  kindness  towards 
him  spun  little  threads  of  tenderness  from  out  his 
heart  towards  hers. 

Thus  it  happened  that  after  Sir  James  had  ridden 
rather  fast  for  half  an  hour  in  a  direction  away  from 
Tipton  Grange,  he  slackened  his  pace,  and  at  last 
turned  into  a  road  which  would  lead  him  back  by  a 
shorter  cut.  Various  feelings  wrought  in  him  the 
determination  after  all  to  go  to  the  Grange  to-day  as 
if  nothing  new  had  happened.  He  could  not  help  re- 
joicing that  he  had  never  made  the  offer  and  been 
rejected ;  mere  friendly  politeness  required  that  he 
should  call  to  see  Dorothea  about  the  cottages,  and 
now  happily  Mrs.  Cadwallader  had  prepared  him  to 
offer  his  congratulations,  if  necessary,  without  show- 
ing too  much  awkwardness.  He  really  did  not  like 
it :  giving  up  Dorothea  was  very  painful  to  him  ; 
but  there  was  something  in  the  resolve  to  make 
this  visit  forthwith  and  conquer  all  show  of  feeling, 
which  was  a  sort  of  file-biting  and  counter-irritant. 
And  without  his  distinctly  recognizing  the  impulse, 
there  certainly  was  present  in  him  the  sense  that 
Celia  would  be  there,  and  that  he  should  pay  her 
more  attention  than  he  had  done  before. 


MISS  BROOKE.  81 

We  mortals,  men  and  women,  devour  many  a  dis- 
appointment between  breakfast  and  dinner-time ; 
keep  back  the  tears  and  look  a  little  pale  about  the 
lips,  and  in  answer  to  inquiries  say,  "  Oh,  nothing  ! " 
Pride  helps  us ;  and  pride  is  not  a  bad  thing  when 
it  only  urges  us  to  hide  our  own  hurts  —  not  to 
hurt  others. 

VOL.  I.  —  6 


CHAPTER  VII. 

Piacer  e  popone 
Vuol  la  sua  stagione. 

Italian  Proverb. 

MR.  CASAUBON,  as  might  be  expected,  spent  a  great 
deal  of  his  time  at  the  Grange  in  these  weeks,  and 
the  hindrance  which  courtship  occasioned  to  the 
progress  of  his  great  work  —  the  Key  to  all  My- 
thologies —  naturally  made  him  look  forward  the 
more  eagerly  to  the  happy  termination  of  court- 
ship. But  he  had  deliberately  incurred  the  hin- 
drance, having  made  up  his  mind  that  it  was  now 
time  for  him  to  adorn  his  life  with  the  graces  of 
female  companionship,  to  irradiate  the  gloom  which 
fatigue  was  apt  to  hang  over  the  intervals  of  studi- 
ous labour  with  the  play  of  female  fancy,  and  to 
secure  in  this,  his  culminating  age,  the  solace  of 
female  tendance  for  his  declining  years.  Hence  he 
determined  to  abandon  himself  to  the  stream  of 
feeling,  and  perhaps  was  surprised  to  find  what  an 
exceedingly  shallow  rill  it  was.  As  in  droughty 
regions  baptism  by  immersion  could  only  be  per- 
formed symbolically,  so  Mr.  Casaubon  found  that 
sprinkling  was  the  utmost  approach  to  a  plunge 
which  his  stream  would  afford  him ;  and  he  con- 
cluded that  the  poets  had  much  exaggerated  the 
force  of  masculine  passion.  Nevertheless,  he  ob- 
served with  pleasure  that  Miss  Brooke  showed  an 
ardent  submissive  affection  which  promised  to  fulfil 
his  most  agreeable  previsions  of  marriage.  It  had 


MISS  BROOKE.  83 

once  or  twice  crossed  his  mind  that  possibly  there 
was  some  deficiency  in  Dorothea  to  account  for  the 
moderation  of  his  abandonment ;  but  he  was  unable 
to  discern  the  deficiency,  or  to  figure  to  himself  a 
woman  who  would  have  pleased  him  better;  so 
that  there  was  clearly  no  reason  to  fall  back  upon 
but  the  exaggerations  of  human  tradition. 

"  Could  I  not  be  preparing  myself  now  to  be  more 
useful  ? "  said  Dorothea  to  him,  one  morning,  early 
in  the  time  of  courtship ;  "  could  I  not  learn  to  read 
Latin  and  Greek  aloud  to  you,  as  Milton's  daughters 
did  to  their  father,  without  understanding  what  they 
read  ? " 

"  I  fear  that  would  be  wearisome  to  you,"  said 
Mr.  Casaubon,  smiling ;  "  and,  indeed,  if  I  remember 
rightly,  the  young  women  you  have  mentioned  re- 
garded that  exercise  in  unknown  tongues  as  a 
ground  for  rebellion  against  the  poet." 

"Yes;  but  in  the  first  place  they  were  very 
naughty  girls,  else  they  would  have  been  proud  to 
minister  to  such  a  father ;  and  in  the  second  place 
they  might  have  studied  privately  and  taught  them- 
selves to  understand  what  they  read,  and  then  it 
would  have  been  interesting.  I  hope  you  don't 
expect  me  to  be  naughty  and  stupid  ? " 

"  I  expect  you  to  be  all  that  an  exquisite  young 
lady  can  be  in  every  possible  relation  of  life.  Cer- 
tainly it  might  be  a  great  advantage  if  you  were 
able  to  copy  the  Greek  character,  and  to  that  end 
it  were  well  to  begin  with  a  little  reading." 

Dorothea  seized  this  as  a  precious  permission. 
She  would  not  have  asked  Mr.  Casaubon  at  once  to 
teach  her  the  languages,  dreading  of  all  things  to 
be  tiresome  instead  of  helpful ;  but  it  was  not 
entirely  out  of  devotion  to  her  future  husband  that 


84  M1DDLEMAKCH. 

she  wished  to  know  Latin  and  Greek.  Those  pro- 
vinces of  masculine  knowledge  seemed  to  her  a 
standing-ground  from  which  all  truth  could  be 
seen  more  truly.  As  it  was,  she  constantly  doubted 
her  own  conclusions,  because  she  felt  her  own 
ignorance :  how  could  she  be  confident  that  one- 
roomed  cottages  were  not  for  the  glory  of  God, 
when  men  who  knew  the  classics  appeared  to 
conciliate  indifference  to  the  cottages  with  zeal  for 
the  glory  ?  Perhaps  even  Hebrew  might  be  neces- 
sary—  at  least  the  alphabet  and  a  few  roots  —  in 
order  to  arrive  at  the  core  of  things,  and  judge 
soundly  on  the  social  duties  of  the  Christian.  And 
she  had  not  reached  that  point  of  renunciation  at 
which  she  would  have  been  satisfied  with  having 
a  wise  husband :  she  wished,  poor  child,  to  be  wise 
herself.  Miss  Brooke  was  certainly  very  naive  with 
all  her  alleged  cleverness.  Celia,  whose  mind  had 
never  been  thought  too  powerful,  saw  the  emptiness 
of  other  people's  pretensions  much  more  readily. 
To  have  in  general  but  little  feeling,  seems  to  be 
the  only  security  against  feeling  too  much  on  any 
particular  occasion. 

However,  Mr.  Casaubon  consented  to  listen  and 
teach  for  an  hour  together,  like  a  schoolmaster  of 
little  boys,  or  rather  like  a  lover,  to  whom  a  mis- 
tress's elementary  ignorance  and  difficulties  have  a 
touching  fitness.  Few  scholars  would  have  dis- 
liked teaching  the  alphabet  under  such  circum- 
stances. But  Dorothea  herself  was  a  little  shocked 
and  discouraged  at  her  own  stupidity,  and  the 
answers  she  got  to  some  timid  questions  about  the 
value  of  the  Greek  accents  gave  her  a  painful  sus- 
picion that  here  indeed  there  might  be  secrets  not 
capable  of  explanation  to  a  woman's  reason. 


MISS  BROOKE.  85 

Mr.  Brooke  had  no  doubt  on  that  point,  and 
expressed  himself  with  his  usual  strength  upon  it 
one  day  that  he  came  into  the  library  while  the 
reading  was  going  forward. 

"Well,  but  now,  Casaubon,  such  deep  studies, 
classics,  mathematics,  that  kind  of  thing,  are  too 
taxing  for  a  woman,  —  too  taxing,  you  know." 

"  Dorothea  is  learning  to  read  the  characters  sim- 
ply," said  Mr.  Casaubon,  evading  the  question. 
"  She  had  the  very  considerate  thought  of  saving 
my  eyes." 

"  Ah,  well,  without  understanding,  you  know,  — 
that  may  not  be  so  bad.  But  there  is  a  lightness 
about  the  feminine  mind  —  a  touch  and  go  — 
music,  the  fine  arts,  that  kind  of  thing  —  they 
should  study  those  up  to  a  certain  point,  women 
should ;  but  in  a  light  way,  you  know.  A  woman 
should  be  able  to  sit  down  and  play  you  or  sing 
you  a  good  old  English  tune.  That  is  what  I  like; 
though  I  have  heard  most  things,  —  been  at  the 
opera  in  Vienna :  Gluck,  Mozart,  everything  of  that 
sort.  But  I  'm  a  conservative  in  music,  —  it 's  not 
like  ideas,  you  know.  I  stick  to  the  good  old 
tunes." 

"  Mr.  Casaubon  is  not  fond  of  the  piano,  and  I 
am  very  glad  he  is  not,"  said  Dorothea,  whose 
slight  regard  for  domestic  music  and  feminine  fine 
art  must  be  forgiven  her,  considering  the  small 
tinkling  and  smearing  in  which  they  chiefly  con- 
sisted at  that  dark  period.  She  smiled  and  looked 
up  at  her  betrothed  with  grateful  eyes.  If  he  had 
always  been  asking  her  to  play  the  "  Last  Kose  of 
Summer,"  she  would  have  required  much  resigna- 
tion. "  He  says  there  is  only  an  old  harpsichord 
at  Lowick,  and  it  is  covered  with  books." 


86  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  Ah,  there  you  are  behind  Celia,  my  dear.  Celia, 
now,  plays  very  prettily,  and  is  always  ready  to 
play.  However,  since  Casaubon  does  not  like  it, 
you  are  all  right.  But  it 's  a  pity  you  should  not 
have  little  recreations  of  that  sort,  Casaubon  :  the 
bow  always  strung  —  that  kind  of  thing,  you  know 
—  will  not  do." 

"  I  never  could  look  on  it  in  the  light  of  a  recrea- 
tion to  have  my  ears  teased  with  measured  noises," 
said  Mr.  Casaubon.  "  A  tune  much  iterated  has 
the  ridiculous  effect  of  making  the  words  in  my 
mind  perform  a  sort  of  minuet  to  keep  time,  —  an 
effect  hardly  tolerable,  I  imagine,  after  boyhood. 
As  to  the  grander  forms  of  music,  worthy  to  accom- 
pany solemn  celebrations,  and  even  to  serve  as  an 
educating  influence  according  to  the  ancient  con- 
ception, I  say  nothing,  for  with  these  we  are  not 
immediately  concerned." 

"  No ;  but  music  of  that  sort  I  should  enjoy," 
said  Dorothea.  "  When  we  were  coming  home 
from  Lausanne,  my  uncle  took  us  to  hear  the  great 
organ  at  Freiberg,  and  it  made  me  sob." 

"  That  kind  of  thing  is  not  healthy,  my  dear," 
said  Mr.  Brooke.  "  Casaubon,  she  will  be  in  your 
hands  now :  you  must  teach  my  niece  to  take 
things  more  quietly,  eh,  Dorothea  ? " 

He  ended  with  a  smile,  not  wishing  to  hurt  his 
niece,  but  really  thinking  that  it  was  perhaps 
better  for  her  to  be  early  married  to  so  sober  a 
fellow  as  Casaubon,  since  she  would  not  hear  of 
Chettam. 

"It  is  wonderful,  though,"  he  said  to  himself  as 
he  shuffled  out  of  the  room,' —  "  it  is  wonderful 
that  she  should  have  liked  him.  However,  the 
match  is  good.  I  should  have  been  travelling  out 


MISS  BROOKE.  87 

of  my  brief  to  have  hindered  it,  let  Mrs.  Cad- 
wallader  say  what  she  will.  He  is  pretty  certain 
to  be  a  bishop,  is  Casaubon.  That  was  a  very  sea- 
sonable pamphlet  of  his  on  the  Catholic  Question  : 
a  deanery  at  least.  They  owe  him  a  deanery." 

And  here  I  must  vindicate  a  claim  to  philosophi- 
cal reflectiveness,  by  remarking  that  Mr.  Brooke  on 
this  occasion  little  thought  of  the  Eadical  speech 
which  at  a  later  period  he  was  led  to  make  on  the 
incomes  of  the  bishops.  What  elegant  historian 
would  neglect  a  striking  opportunity  for  pointing 
out  that  his  heroes  did  not  foresee  the  history  of 
the  world,  or  even  their  own  actions  ?  -—  For  exam- 
ple, that  Henry  of  Navarre,  when  a  Protestant 
baby,  little  thought  of  being  a  Catholic  monarch; 
or  that  Alfred  the  Great,  when  he  measured  his 
laborious  nights  with  burning  candles,  had  no  idea 
of  future  gentlemen  measuring  their  idle  days  with 
watches.  Here  is  a  mine  of  truth,  which,  however 
vigorously  it  may  be  worked,  is  likely  to  outlast 
our  coal.  . 

But  of  Mr.  Brooke  I  make  a  further  remark  per- 
haps less  warranted  by  precedent,  —  namely,  that 
if  he  had  foreknown  his  speech,  it  might  not  have 
made  any  great  difference.  To  think  with  plea- 
sure of  his  niece's  husband  having  a  large  ecclesias- 
tical income  was  one  thing,  —  to  make  a  Liberal 
speech  was  another  thing ;  and  it  is  a  narrow  mind 
which  cannot  look  at  a  subject  from  various  points 
of  view. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

"  Oh,  rescue  her !  I  am  her  brother  now, 
And  you  her  father.     Ever}'  gentle  maid 
Should  have  a  guardian  in  each  gentleman." 

IT  was  wonderful  to  Sir  James  Chettam  how  well 
he  continued  to  like  going  to  the  Grange  after  he 
had  once  encountered  the  difficulty  of  seeing  Doro- 
thea for  the  first  time  in  the  light  of  a  woman  who 
was  engaged  to  another  man.  Of  course  the  forked 
lightning  seemed  to  pass  through  him  when  he 
first  approached  her,  and  he  remained  conscious 
throughout  the  interview  of  hiding  uneasiness  ;  but, 
good  as  he  was,  it  must  be  owned  that  his  uneasi- 
ness was  less  than  it  would  have  been  if  he  had 
thought  his  rival  a  brilliant  and  desirable  match. 
He  had  no  sense  of  being  eclipsed  by  Mr.  Casau- 
bon ;  he  was  only  shocked  that  Dorothea  was  under 
a  melancholy  illusion,  and  his  mortification  lost 
some  of  its  bitterness  by  being  mingled  with 
compassion. 

Nevertheless,  while  Sir  James  said  to  himself 
that  he  had  completely  resigned  her,  since  with  the 
perversity  of  a  Desdemona  she  had  not  affected  a 
proposed  match  that  was  clearly  suitable  and  accord- 
ing to  nature,  he  could  not  yet  be  quite  passive 
under  the  idea  of  her  engagement  to  Mr.  Casaubou. 
On  the  day  when  he  first  saw  them  together  in  the 
light  of  his  present  knowledge,  it  seemed  to  him 
that  he  had  not  taken  the  affair  seriously  enough. 
Brooke  was  really  culpable ;  he  ought  to  have  hin- 


MISS   BROOKE.  89 

dered  it.  Who  could  speak  to  him  ?  Something 
might  be  done  perhaps  even  now,  at  least  to  de- 
fer the  marriage.  On  his  way  home  he  turned 
into  the  Eectory  and  asked  for  Mr.  Cadwallader. 
Happily,  the  Rector  was  at  home,  and  his  visitor 
was  shown  into  the  study,  where  all  the  fishing- 
tackle  hung.  But  he  himself  was  in  a  little  room 
adjoining,  at  work  with  his  turning  apparatus,  and 
he  called  to  the  baronet  to  join  him  there.  The 
two  were  better  friends  than  any  other  landholder 
and  clergyman  in  the  county,  —  a  significant  fact 
which  was  in  agreement  with  the  amiable  expres- 
sion of  their  faces. 

Mr.  Cadwallader  was  a  large  man,  with  full  lips 
and  a  sweet  smile;  very  plain  and  rough  in  his  ex- 
terior, but  with  that  solid  imperturbable  ease  and 
good-humour  which  is  infectious,  and  like  great 
grassy  hills  in  the  sunshine,  quiets  even  an  irri- 
tated egoism,  and  makes  it  rather  ashamed  of  itself. 
"  Well,  how  are  you  ? "  he  said,  showing  a  hand  not 
quite  fit  to  be  grasped.  "  Sorry  I  missed  you  before. 
Is  there  anything  particular  ?  You  look  vexed." 

Sir  James's  brow  had  a  little  crease  in  it,  a  little 
depression  of  the  eyebrow,  which  he  seemed  pur- 
posely to  exaggerate  as  he  answered,  — 

"  It  is  only  this  conduct  of  Brooke's.  I  really 
think  somebody  should  speak  to  him." 

"  What  ?  meaning  to  stand  ?  "  said  Mr.  Cadwal- 
lader, going  on  with  the  arrangement  of  the  reels 
which  he  had  just  been  turning.  "  I  hardly  think 
he  means  it.  But  where  's  the  harm,  if  he  likes  it  ? 
Any  one  who  objects  to  Whiggery  should  be  glad 
when  the  Whigs  don't  put  up  the  strongest  fellow. 
They  won't  overturn  the  Constitution  with  our  friend 
Brooke's  head  for  a  battering-ram." 


90  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"Oh,  I  don't  mean  that,"  said  Sir  James,  who, 
after  putting  down  his  hat  and  throwing  himself 
into  a  chair,  had  begun  to  nurse  his  leg  and  exam- 
ine the  sole  of  his  boot  with  much  bitterness.  "  I 
mean  this  marriage.  I  mean  his  letting  that  bloom- 
ing young  girl  marry  Casaubon." 

"  What  is  the  matter  with  Casaubon  ?  I  see  no 
harm  in  him  —  if  the  girl  likes  him." 

"  She  is  too  young  to  know  what  she  likes.  Her 
guardian  ought  to  interfere.  He  ought  not  to  allow 
the  thing  to  be  done  in  this  headlong  manner.  I 
wonder  a  man  like  you,  Cadwallader,  —  a  man  with 
daughters,  —  can  look  at  the  affair  with  indiffer- 
ence :  and  with  such  a  heart  as  yours  !  Do  think 
seriously  about  it." 

"  I  am  not  joking ;  I  am  as  serious  as  possible," 
said  the  Eector,  with  a  provoking  little  inward  laugh. 
"  You  are  as  bad  as  Elinor.  She  has  been  wanting 
me  to  go  and  lecture  Brooke ;  and  I  have  reminded 
her  that  her  friends  had  a  very  poor  opinion  of  the 
match  she  made  when  she  married  me." 

"But  look  at  Casaubon,"  said  Sir  James,  indig- 
nantly. "  He  must  be  fifty,  and  I  don't  believe  he 
could  ever  have  been  much  more  than  the  shadow 
of  a  man.  Look  at  his  legs  ! " 

"  Confound  you  handsome  young  fellows !  you 
think  of  having  it  all  your  own  way  in  the  world. 
You  don't  understand  women.  They  don't  admire 
you  half  so  much  as  you  admire  yourselves.  Elinor 
used  to  tell  her  sisters  that  she  married  me  for  my 
ugliness,  —  it  was  so  various  and  amusing  that  it 
had  quite  conquered  her  prudence." 

"You!  it  was  easy  enough  for  a  woman  to  love 
you.  But  this  is  no  question  of  beauty.  I  don't 
like  Casaubon."  This  was  Sir  James's  strongest 


MISS  BROOKE.  91 

way  of  implying  that  he  thought  ill  of  a  man's 
character. 

"  Why  ?  what  do  you  know  against  him  ? "  said 
the  Eector,  laying  down  his  reels,  and  putting  his 
thumbs  into  his  armholes  with  an  air  of  attention. 

Sir  James  paused.  He  did  not  usually  find  it  easy 
to  give  his  reasons :  it  seemed  to  him  strange  that 
people  should  not  know  them  without  being  told, 
since  he  only  felt  what  was  reasonable.  At  last 
he  said, — 

"  Now,  Cadwallader,  has  he  got  any  heart  ? " 

"Well,  yes.  I  don't  mean  of  the  melting  sort, 
but  a  sound  kernel,  that  you  may  be  sure  of.  He 
is  very  good  to  his  poor  relations :  pensions  several 
of  the  women,  and  is  educating  a  young  fellow  at  a 
good  deal  of  expense.  Casaubon  acts  up  to  his 
sense  of  justice.  His  mother's  sister  made  a  bad 
match  —  a  Pole,  I  think  —  lost  herself  —  at  any 
rate,  was  disowned  by  her  family.  If  it  had  not 
been  for  that,  Casaubon  would  not  have  had  so 
much  money  by  half.  I  believe  he  went  himself  to 
find  out  his  cousins,  and  see  what  he  could  do  for 
them.  Every  man  would  not  ring  so  well  as  that, 
if  you  tried  his  metal.  You  would,  Chettain ;  but 
not  every  man." 

"  I  don't  know,"  said  Sir  James,  colouring.  "  I  am 
not  so  sure  of  myself."  He  paused  a  moment,  and 
then  added :  "  That  was  a  right  thing  for  Casaubon  to 
do.  But  a  man  may  wish  to  do  what  is  right,  and 
yet  be  a  sort  of  parchment  code.  A  woman  may  not 
be  happy  with  him.  And  I  think  when  a  girl  is  so 
young  as  Miss  Brooke  is,  her  friends  ought  to  inter- 
fere a  little  to  hinder  her  from  doing  anything 
foolish.  You  laugh,  because  you  fancy  I  have  some 
feeling  on  my  own  account.  But  upon  my  honour, 


92  MIDDLEMARCH. 

it  is  not  that.  I  should  feel  just  the  same  if  I  were 
Miss  Brooke's  brother  or  uncle." 

"  Well,  but  what  should  you  do  ? " 

"  I  should  say  that  the  marriage  must  not  be 
decided  on  until  she  was  of  age.  And  depend 
upon  it,  in  that  case,  it  would  never  come  off.  I 
wish  you  saw  it  as  I  do,  —  I  wish  you  would  talk 
to  Brooke  about  it." 

Sir  James  rose  as  he  was  finishing  his  sentence, 
for  he  saw  Mrs.  Cadwallader  entering  from  the 
study.  She  held  by  the  hand  her  youngest  girl, 
about  five  years  old,  who  immediately  ran  to  papa, 
and  was  made  comfortable  on  his  knee. 

"  I  hear  what  you  are  talking  about,"  said  the 
wife.  "  But  you  will  make  no  impression  on  Hum- 
phrey. As  long  as  the  fish  rise  to  his  bait,  every- 
body is  what  he  ought  to  be.  Bless  you,  Casaubon 
has  got  a  trout-stream,  and  does  not  care  about  fish- 
ing in  it  himself:  could  there  be  a  better  fellow?" 

"  Well,  there  is  something  in  that,"  said  the 
Eector,  with  his  quiet,  inward  laugh.  "  It  is  a  very 
good  quality  in  a  man  to  have  a  trout-stream." 

"  But  seriously,"  said  Sir  James,  whose  vexation 
had  not  yet  spent  itself,  "  don't  you  think  the 
Eector  might  do  some  good  by  speaking  ?  " 

"  Oh,  I  told  you  beforehand  what  he  would  say," 
answered  Mrs.  Cadwallader,  lifting  up  her  eye- 
brows. "  I  have  done  what  I  could  :  I  wash  my 
hands  of  the  marriage." 

"In  the  first  place,"  said  the  Eector,  looking 
rather  grave,  "it  would  be  nonsensical  to  expect 
that  I  could  convince  Brooke,  and  make  him  act 
accordingly.  Brooke  is  a  very  good  fellow,  but 
pulpy ;  he  will  run  into  any  mould,  but  he  won't 
keep  shape." 


MISS  BROOKE.  93 

"  He  might  keep  shape  long  enough  to  defer  the 
marriage,"  said  Sir  James. 

"  But,  my  dear  Chettam,  why  should  I  use  my 
influence  to  Casaubon's  disadvantage,  unless  I  were 
much  surer  than  I  am  that  I  should  be  acting  for 
the  advantage  of  Miss  Brooke  ?  I  know  no  harm 
of  Casaubon.  I  don't  care  about  his  Xisuthrus  and 
Fee-fo-fum  and  the  rest;  but  then  he  doesn't  care 
about  my  fishing-tackle.  As  to  the  line  he  took  on 
the  Catholic  Question,  that  was  unexpected ;  but  he 
has  always  been  civil  to  me,  and  I  don't  see  why  I 
should  spoil  his  sport.  For  anything  I  can  tell, 
Miss  Brooke  may  be  happier  with  him  than  she 
would  be  with  any  other  man." 

"  Humphrey !  I  have  no  patience  with  you. 
You  know  you  would  rather  dine  under  the  hedge 
than  with  Casaubon  alone.  You  have  nothing  to 
say  to  each  other." 

"What  has  that  to  do  with  Miss  Brooke's  marry- 
ing him  ?  She  does  not  do  it  for  my  amusement." 

"  He  has  got  no  good  red  blood  in  his  body,"  said 
Sir  James. 

"  No.  Somebody  put  a  drop  under  a  magnifying- 
glass,  and  it  was  all  semicolons  and  parentheses," 
said  Mrs.  Cadwallader. 

"  Why  does  he  not  bring  out  his  book,  instead  of 
marrying  ? "  said  Sir  James,  with  a  disgust  which  he 
held  warranted  by  the  sound  feeling  of  an  English 
layman. 

"Oh,  he  dreams  footnotes,  and  they  run  away 
with  all  his  brains.  They  say,  when  he  was  a  lit- 
tle boy,  he  made  an  abstract  of  '  Hop  o'  my  Thumb/ 
and  he  has  been  making  abstracts  ever  since. 
Ugh  !  And  that  is  the  man  Humphrey  goes  on 
saying  that  a  woman  may  be  happy  with." 


94  MIDDLEMA11CH. 

"  Well,  lie  is  what  Miss  Brooke  likes,"  said  the 
Rector.  "  I  don't  profess  to  understand  every 
young  lady's  taste." 

"  But  if  she  were  your  own  daughter  ? "  said  Sir 
James. 

"  That  would  be  a  different  affair.  She  is  not  my 
daughter,  and  I  don't  feel  called  upon  to  interfere. 
Casaubon  is  as  good  as  most  of  us.  He  is  a 
scholarly  clergyman,  and  creditable  to  the  cloth. 
Some  Radical  fellow  speechifying  at  Middlemarch 
said  Casaubon  was  the  learned  straw-chopping 
incumbent,  and  Freke  was  the  brick-and-mortar 
incumbent,  and  I  was  the  angling  incumbent.  And 
upon  my  word,  I  don't  see  that  one  is  worse  or  bet- 
ter than  the  other."  The  Rector  ended  with  his 
silent  laugh.  He  always  saw  the  joke  of  any  satire 
against  himself.  His  conscience  was  large  and 
easy,  like  the  rest  of  him :  it  did  only  what  it  could 
do  without  any  trouble. 

Clearly,  there  would  be  no  interference  with 
Miss  Brooke's  marriage  through  Mr.  Cadwallader; 
and  Sir  James  felt  with  some  sadness  that  she  was 
to  have  perfect  liberty  of  misjudgment.  It  was  a 
sign  of  his  good  disposition  that  he  did  not  slacken 
at  all  in  his  intention  of  carrying  out  Dorothea's 
design  of  the  cottages.  Doubtless  this  persistence 
was  the  best  course  for  his  own  dignity  :  but  pride 
only  helps  us  to  be  generous  ;  it  never  makes  us  so, 
any  more  than  vanity  makes  us  witty.  She  was 
now  enough  aware  of  Sir  James's  position  with 
regard  to  her  to  appreciate  the  rectitude  of  his  per- 
severance in  a  landlord's  duty,  to  which  he  had  at 
first  been  urged  by  a  lover's  complaisance ;  and  her 
pleasure  in  it  was  great  enough  to  count  for  some- 
thing even  in  her  present  happiness.  Perhaps  she 


MISS  BROOKE.  95 

gave  to  Sir  James  Chettam's  cottages?  all  the  interest 
she  could  spare  from  Mr.  Casaubon,  or  rather  from 
the  symphony  of  hopeful  dreams,  admiring  trust, 
and  passionate  self-devotion  which  that  learned 
gentleman  had  set  playing  in  her  soul.  Hence  it 
happened  that  in  the  good  baronet's  succeeding 
visits,  while  he  was  beginning  to  pay  small  atten- 
tions to  Celia,  he  found  himself  talking  with  more 
and  more  pleasure  to  Dorothea.  She  was  perfectly 
unconstrained  and  without  irritation  towards  him 
now,  and  he  was  gradually  discovering  the  delight 
there  is  in  frank  kindness  and  companionship 
between  a  man  and  a  woman  who  have  no  passion 
to  hide  or  confess. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

"  1st  Gent.  An  ancient  land  in  ancient  oracles 

Is  called  '  law-thirsty : '  all  the  struggle  there 
Was  after  order  and  a  perfect  rule. 
Pray,  where  lie  such  lands  now  1 .  .  . 
2d  Gent.   Why,  where  they  lay  of  old  —  in  human  souls." 

MR.  CASAUBON'S  behaviour  about  settlements  was 
highly  satisfactory  to  Mr.  Brooke,  and  the  prelimi- 
naries of  marriage  rolled  smoothly  along,  shortening 
the  weeks  of  courtship.  The  betrothed  bride  must 
see  her  future  home,  and  dictate  any  changes  that 
she  would  like  to  have  made  there.  A  woman  dic- 
tates before  marriage  in  order  that  she  may  have  an 
appetite  for  submission  afterwards.  And  certainly, 
the  mistakes  that  we  male  and  female  mortals  make 
when  we  have  our  own  way  might  fairly  raise  some 
wonder  that  we  are  so  fond  of  it. 

On  a  gray  but  dry  November  morning  Dorothea 
drove  to  Lowick  in  company  with  her  uncle  and 
Celia.  Mr.  Casaubon's  home  was  the  manor-house. 
Close  by,  visible  from  some  parts  of  the  garden,  was 
the  little  church,  with  the  old  parsonage  opposite. 
In  the  beginning  of  his  career,  Mr.  Casaubon  had 
only  held  the  living,  but  the  death  of  his  brother 
had  put  him  in  possession  of  the  manor  also.  It 
had  a  small  park,  with  a  fine  old  oak  here  and 
there,  and  an  avenue  of  limes  towards  the  southwest 
front,  with  a  sunk  fence  between  park  and  pleasure- 
ground,  so  that  from  the  drawing-room  windows  the 
glance  swept  uninterruptedly  along  a  slope  of  green- 


MISS  BROOKE.  97 

sward  till  the  limes  ended  in  a  level  of  corn  and 
pastures,  which  often  seemed  to  melt  into  a  lake 
under  the  setting  sun.  This  was  the  happy  side  of 
the  house,  for  the  south  and  east  looked  rather 
melancholy  even  under  the  brightest  morning. 
The  grounds  here  were  more  confined,  the  flower- 
beds showed  no  very  careful  tendance,  and  large 
clumps  of  trees,  chiefly  of  sombre  yews,  had  risen 
high,  not  ten  yards  from  the  windows.  The  build- 
ing, of  greenish  stone,  was  in  the  old  English  style, 
not  ugly,  but  small-windowed  and  melancholy-look- 
ing: the  sort  of  house  that  must  have  children, 
many  flowers,  open  windows,  and  little  vistas  of 
bright  things,  to  make  it  seem  a  joyous  home.  In 
this  latter  end  of  autumn,  with  a  sparse  remnant  of 
yellow  leaves  falling  slowly  athwart  the  dark  ever- 
greens in  a  stillness  without  sunshine,  the  house 
too  had  an  air  of  autumnal  decline,  and  Mr.  Casau- 
bon,  when  he  presented  himself,  had  no  bloom  that 
could  be  thrown  into  relief  by  that  background. 

"  Oh  dear ! "  Celia  said  to  herself,  "  I  am  sure 
Freshitt  Hall  would  have  been  pleasanter  than 
this."  She  thought  of  the  white  freestone,  the  pil- 
lared portico,  and  the  terrace  full  of  flowers,  Sir 
James  smiling  above  them  like  a  prince  issuing 
from  his  enchantment  in  a  rose-bush,  with  a  hand- 
kerchief swiftly  metamorphosed  from  the  most  deli- 
cately odorous  petals,  —  Sir  James,  who  talked  so 
agreeably,  always  about  things  which  had  common- 
sense  in  them,  and  not  about  learning !  Celia  had 
those  light  young  feminine  tastes  which  grave  and 
weather-worn  gentlemen  sometimes  prefer  in  a  wife  ; 
but  happily  Mr.  Casaubon's  bias  had  been  different, 
for  he  would  have  had  no  chance  with  Celia. 

Dorothea,  on  the  contrary,  found  the  house  and 
VOL.  i.  —  7 


98  MIDDLEMAECH. 

grounds  all  that  she  could  wish :  the  dark  book- 
shelves in  the  long  library,  the  carpets  and  curtains 
with  colours  subdued  by  time,  the  curious  old  maps 
and  bird's-eye  views  on  the  walls  of  the  corridor, 
with  here  and  there  an  old  vase  below,  had  no  oppres- 
sion for  her,  and  seemed  more  cheerful  than  the 
casts  and  pictures  at  the  Grange,  which  her  uncle 
had  long  ago  brought  home  from  his  travels,  —  they 
being  probably  among  the  ideas  he  had  taken  in  at 
one  time.  To  poor  Dorothea  these  severe  classical 
nudities  and  smirking  Renaissance-Correggiosities 
were  painfully  inexplicable,  staring  into  the  midst 
of  her  Puritanic  conceptions :  she  had  never  been 
taught  how  she  could  bring  them  into  any  sort  of 
relevance  with  her  life.  But  the  owners  of  Lowick 
apparently  had  not  been  travellers,  and  Mr.  Casau- 
bon's  studies  of  the  past  were  not  carried  on  by 
means  of  such  aids. 

Dorothea  walked  about  the  house  with  delightful 
emotion.  Everything  seemed  hallowed  to  her:  this 
was  to  be  the  home  of  her  wifehood,  and  she  looked 
up  with  eyes  full  of  confidence  to  Mr.  Casaubon 
when  he  drew  her  attention  specially  to  some  actual 
arrangement,  and  asked  her  if  she  would  like  an 
alteration.  All  appeals  to  her  taste  she  met  grate- 
fully, but  saw  nothing  to  alter.  His  efforts  at  ex- 
act courtesy  and  formal  tenderness  had  no  defect 
for  her.  She  filled  up  all  blanks  with  unmanifested 
perfections,  interpreting  him  as  she  interpreted  the 
works  of  Providence,  and  accounting  for  seeming 
discords  by  her  own  deafness  to  the  higher  harmo- 
nies. And  there  are  many  blanks  left  in  the  weeks 
of  courtship  which  a  loving  faith  fills  with  happy 
assurance. 

"  Now,  my  dear  Dorothea,  I  wish  you  to  favour 


MISS  BROOKE.  99 

me  by  pointing  out  which  room  you  would  like  to 
have  as  your  boudoir,"  said  Mr.  Casaubon,  showing 
that  his  views  of  the  womanly  nature  were  suffi- 
ciently large  to  include  that  requirement. 

"It  is  very  kind  of  you  to  think  of  that,"  said 
Dorothea,  "  but  I  assure  you  I  would  rather  have 
all  those  matters  decided  for  me.  I  shall  be  much 
happier  to  take  everything  as  it  is,  —  just  as  you 
have  been  used  to  have  it,  or  as  you  will  yourself 
choose  it  to  be.  I  have  no  motive  for  wishing  any- 
thing else." 

"  Oh,  Dodo,"  said  Celia,  "  will  you  not  have  the 
bow-windowed  room  upstairs  ? " 

Mr.  Casaubon  led  the  way  thither.  The  bow- 
window  looked  down  the  avenue  of  limes ;  the  fur- 
niture was  all  of  a  faded  blue,  and  there  were 
miniatures  of  ladies  and  gentlemen  with  powdered 
hair  hanging  in  a  group.  A  piece  of  tapestry  over 
a  door  also  showed  a  blue-green  world  with  a  pale 
stag  in  it.  The  chairs  and  tables  were  thin-legged 
and  easy  to  upset.  It  was  a  room  where  one  might 
fancy  the  ghost  of  a  tight-laced  lady  revisiting  the 
scene  of  her  embroidery.  A  light  book-case  con- 
tained duodecimo  volumes  of  polite  literature  in  calf, 
completing  the  furniture. 

"  Yes,"  said  Mr.  Brooke,  "  this  would  be  a  pretty 
room  with  some  new  hangings,  sofas,  and  that  sort 
of  thing.  A  little  bare  now." 

"  No.  uncle,"  said  Dorothea,  eagerly.  "  Pray  do 
not  speak  of  altering  anything.  There  are  so  many 
other  things  in  the  world  that  want  altering,  —  I 
like  to  take  these  things  as  they  are.  And  you  like 
them  as  they  are,  don't  you?"  she  added,  looking 
at  Mr.  Casaubon.  "  Perhaps  this  was  your  mother's 
room  when  she  was  young." 


ioo  MIDDLEMAECH. 

"  It  was,"  he  said,  with  his  slow  bend  of  the  head. 

"This  is  your  mother,"  said  Dorothea,  who  had 
turned  to  examine  the  group  of  miniatures.  "  It  is 
like  the  tiny  one  you  brought  me ;  only,  I  should 
think,  a  better  portrait.  And  this  one  opposite,  who 
is  this  ? " 

"  Her  elder  sister.  They  were,  like  you  and  your 
sister,  the  only  two  children  of  their  parents,  who 
hang  above  them,  you  see." 

"The  sister  is  pretty,"  said  Celia,  implying  that 
she  thought  less  favourably  of  Mr.  Casaubon's 
mother.  It  was  a  new  opening  to  Celia's  imagina- 
tion, that  he  came  of  a  family  who  had  all  been 
young  in  their  time,  —  the  ladies  wearing  necklaces. 

"It  is  a  peculiar  face,"  said  Dorothea,  looking 
closely.  "  Those  deep  gray  eyes  rather  near  together, 
—  and  the  delicate  irregular  nose  with  a  sort  of 
ripple  in  it,  —  and  all  the  powdered  curls  hanging 
backward.  Altogether  it  seems  to  me  peculiar  rather 
than  pretty.  There  is  not  even  a  family  likeness 
between  her  and  your  mother." 

"  No.     And  they  were  not  alike  in  their  lot." 

"  You  did  not  mention  her  to  me,"  said  Dorothea. 

"  My  aunt  made  an  unfortunate  marriage.  I 
never  saw  her." 

Dorothea  wondered  a  little,but  felt  that  it  would  be 
indelicate  just  then  to  ask  for  any  information  which 
Mr.  Casaubon  did  not  proffer,  and  she  turned  to  the 
window  to  admire  the  view.  The  sun  had  lately 
pierced  the  gray,  and  the  avenue  of  limes  cast 
shadows. 

"  Shall  we  not  walk  in  the  garden  now  ? "  said 
Dorothea. 

"  And  you  would  like  to  see  the  church,  you 
know,"  said  Mr.  Brooke.  "  It  is  a  droll  little  church. 


MISS  BROOKE.  101 

And  the  village.  It  all  lies  in  a  nut-shell.  By  the 
way,  it  will  suit  you,  Dorothea ;  for  the  cottages  are 
like  a  row  of  alms-houses,  —  little  gardens,  gilly- 
flowers, that  sort  of  thing." 

"  Yes,  please,"  said  Dorothea,  looking  at  Mr.  Casau- 
bon,  "  I  should  like  to  see  all  that."  She  had  got 
nothing  from  him  more  graphic  about  the  Lowick 
cottages  than  that  they  were  "  not  bad." 

They  were  soon  on  a  gravel  walk  which  led  chiefly 
between  grassy  borders  and  clumps  of  trees,  this 
being  the  nearest  way  to  the  church,  Mr.  Casaubon 
said.  At  the  little  gate  leading  into  the  churchyard 
there  was  a  pause  while  Mr.  Casaubon  went  to  the 
parsonage  close  by  to  fetch  a  key.  Celia,  who  had 
been  hanging  a  little  in  the  rear,  came  up  presently, 
when  she  saw  that  Mr.  Casaubon  was  gone  away, 
and  said,  in  her  easy  staccato,  which  always  seemed 
to  contradict  the  suspicion  of  any  malicious  intent,  — 

"  Do  you  know,  Dorothea,  I  saw  some  one  quite 
young  coming  up  one  of  the  walks." 

"  Is  that  astonishing,  Celia  ? " 

"  There  may  be  a  young  gardener,  you  know,  — 
why  not  ?  "  said  Mr.  Brooke.  "  I  told  Casaubon  he 
should  change  his  gardener." 

"  No,  not  a  gardener,"  said  Celia  ;  "  a  gentleman 
with  a  sketch-book.  He  had  light-brown  curls.  I 
only  saw  his  back.  But  he  was  quite  young." 

"The  curate's  son,  perhaps,"  said  Mr.  Brooke. 
"  Ah,  there  is  Casaubon  again,  and  Tucker  with  him. 
He  is  going  to  introduce  Tucker.  You  don't  know 
Tucker  yet." 

Mr.  Tucker  was  the  middle-aged  curate,  one  of  the 
"  inferior  clergy,"  who  are  usually  not  wanting  in 
sons.  But  after  the  introduction,  the  conversa- 
tion did  not  lead  to  any  question  about  his  family. 


102  MIDDLEMARCH. 

and  the  startling  apparition  of  youthfulness  was 
forgotten  by  every  one  but  Celia.  She  inwardly 
declined  to  believe  that  the  light-brown  curls  and 
slim  figure  could  have  any  relationship  to  Mr. 
Tucker,  who  was  just  as  old  and  musty-looking  as 
she  would  have  expected  Mr.  Casaubon's  curate  to  be  ; 
doubtless  an  excellent  man  who  would  go  to  heaven 
(for  Celia  wished  not  to  be  unprincipled),  but  the 
corners  of  his  mouth  were  so  unpleasant.  Celia 
thought  with  some  dismalness  of  the  time  she 
should  have  to  spend  as  bridesmaid  at  Lowick, 
where  the  curate  had  probably  no  pretty  little 
children  whom  she  could  like,  irrespective,  of 
principle. 

Mr.  Tucker  was  invaluable  in  their  walk ;  and 
perhaps  Mr.  Casaubon  had  not  been  without  fore- 
sight on  this  head,  the  curate  being  able  to  answer 
all  Dorothea's  questions  about  the  villagers  and  the 
other  parishioners.  Everybody,  he  assured  her,  was 
well  off  in  Lowick :  not  a  cottager  in  those  double 
cottages  at  a  low  rent  but  kept  a  pig,  and  the  strips 
of  garden  at  the  back  were  well  tended.  The  small 
\boys  wore  excellent  corduroy ;  the  girls  went  out  as 
tidy  servants,  or  did  a  little  straw-plaiting  at  home : 
no  looms  here,  no  Dissent ;  and  though  the  public 
disposition  was  rather  towards  laying  by  money  than 
towards  spirituality,  there  was  not  much  vice.  The 
speckled  fowls  were  so  numerous  that  Mr.  Brooke 
observed :  "  Your  farmers  leave  some  barley  for  the 
women  to  glean,  I  see.  The  poor  folks  here  might 
have  a  fowl  in  their  pot,  as  the  good  French  king 
used  to  wish  for  all  his  people.  The  French  eat  a 
good  many  fowls, —  skinny  fowls,  you  know." 

"  I  think  it  was  a  very  cheap  wish  of  his,"  said 
Dorothea,  indignantly.  "Are  kings  such  monsters 


MISS  BROOKE.  103 

that  a  wish  like  that  must  be  reckoned  a  royal 
virtue  ? " 

"And  if  he  wished  them  a  skinny  fowl,"  said 
Celia,  "that  would  not  be  nice.  But  perhaps  he 
wished  them  to  have  fat  fowls." 

"  Yes,  but  the  word  has  dropped  out  of  the  text, 
or  perhaps  was  subauditum  ;  that  is,  present  in  the 
king's  mind,  but  not  uttered,"  said  Mr.  Casaubon, 
smiling  and  bending  his  head  towards  Celia,  who 
immediately  dropped  backward  a  little,  because  she 
could  not  bear  Mr.  Casaubon  to  blink  at  her. 

Dorothea  sank  into  silence  on  the  way  back  to 
the  house.  She  felt  some  disappointment,  of  which 
she  was  yet  ashamed,  that  there  was  nothing  for 
her  to  do  in  Lowick  ;  and  in  the  next  few  minutes 
her  mind  had  glanced  over  the  possibility,  which  she 
would  have  preferred,  of  finding  that  her  home 
would  be  in  a  parish  which  had  a  larger  share  of  the 
world's  misery,  so  that  she  might  have  had  more 
active  duties  in  it.  Then,  recurring  to  the  future 
actually  before  her,  she  made  a  picture  of  more  com- 
plete devotion  to  Mr.  Casaubon' s  aims,  in  which 
she  would  await  new  duties.  Many  such  might 
reveal  themselves  to  the  higher  knowledge  gained 
by  her  in  that  companionship. 

Mr.  Tucker  soon  left  them,  having  some  clerical 
work  which  would  not  allow  him  to  lunch  at  the 
Hall;  and  as  they  were  re-entering  the  garden 
through  the  little  gate,  Mr.  Casaubon  said,  — 

"You  seem  a  little  sad,  Dorothea.  I  trust  you 
are  pleased  with  what  you  have  seen." 

"  I  am  feeling  something  which  is  perhaps  foolish 
and  wrong,"  answered  Dorothea,  with  her  usual 
openness,  —  "  almost  wishing  that  the  people  wanted 
more  to  be  done  for  them  here.  I  have  known  so 


104  MIDDLEMARCH. 

few  ways  of  making  my  life  good  for  anything. 
Of  course,  my  notions  of  usefulness  must  be  narrow. 
I  must  learn  new  ways  of  helping  people." 

"  Doubtless,"  said  Mr.  Casaubon.  "  Each  position 
has  its  corresponding  duties.  Yours,  I  trust,  as  the 
mistress  of  Lowick,  will  not  leave  any  yearning 
unfulfilled." 

"  Indeed,  I  believe  that""  said  Dorothea,  earnestly. 
"  Do  not  suppose  that  I  am  sad." 

"  That  is  well.  But  if  you  are  not  tired,  we  will 
take  another  way  to  the  house  than  that  by  which 
we  came." 

Dorothea  was  not  at  all  tired,  and  a  little  circuit 
was  made  towards  a  fine  yew-tree,  the  chief  heredi- 
tary glory  of  the  grounds  on  this  side  of  the  house. 
As  they  approached  it,  a  figure,  conspicuous  on  a 
dark  background  of  evergreens,  was  seated  on  a 
bench,  sketching  the  old  tree.  Mr.  Brooke,  who 
was  walking  in  front  with  Celia,  turned  his  head, 
and  said, — 

"  Who  is  that  youngster,  Casaubon  ? " 

They  had  come  very  near  when  Mr.  Casaubon 
answered,  — 

"  That  is  a  young  relative  of  mine,  a  second  cousin  : 
the  grandson,  in  fact,"  he  added,  looking  at  Dorothea, 
"  of  the  lady  whose  portrait  you  have  been  noticing, 
my  aunt  Julia." 

The  young  man  had  laid  down  his  sketch-book 
and  risen.  His  bushy  light-brown  curls,  as  well  as 
his  youthfulness,  identified  him  at  once  with  Celia's 
apparition. 

"Dorothea,  let  me  introduce  to  you  my  cousin, 
Mr.  Ladislaw.  Will,  this  is  Miss  Brooke." 

The  cousin  was  so  close  now,  that,  when  he  lifted 
his  hat,  Dorothea  could  see  a  pair  of  gray  eyes 
rather  near  together,  a  delicate  irregular  nose  with 


MISS  BROOKE.  105 

a  little  ripple  in  it,  and  hair  falling  backward ;  but 
there  was  a  mouth  and  chin  of  a  more  prominent, 
threatening  aspect  than  belonged  to  the  type  of  the 
grandmother's  miniature.  Young  Ladislaw  did  not 
feel  it  necessary  to  smile,  as  if  he  were  charmed 
with  this  introduction  to  his  future  second  cousin 
and  her  relatives ;  but  wore  rather  a  pouting  air  of 
discontent. 

"  You  are  an  artist,  I  see,"  said  Mr.  Brooke,  tak- 
ing up  the  sketch-book  and  turning  it  over  in  his 
unceremonious  fashion. 

"  No,  I  only  sketch  a  little.  There  is  nothing  fit 
to  be  seen  there,"  said  young  Ladislaw,  colouring, 
perhaps  with  temper  rather  than  modesty. 

"  Oh,  come,  this  is  a  nice  bit,  now.  I  did  a  little 
in  this  way  myself  at  one  time,  you  know.  Look 
here,  now ;  this  is  what  I  call  a  nice  thing,  done 
with  what  we  used  to  call  brio."  Mr.  Brooke  held 
out  towards  the  two  girls  a  large  coloured  sketch  of 
stony  ground  and  trees,  with  a  pool. 

"  I  am  no  judge  of  these  things,"  said  Dorothea, 
not  coldly,  but  with  an  eager  deprecation  of  the 
appeal  to  her.  "  You  know,  uncle,  I  never  see  the 
beauty  of  those  pictures  which  you  say  are  so  much 
praised.  They  are  a  language  I  do  not  understand. 
I  suppose  there  is  some  relation  between  pictures 
and  nature  which  I  am  too  ignorant  to  feel,  —  just 
as  you  see  what  a  Greek  sentence  stands  for  which 
means  nothing  to  me."  Dorothea  looked  up  at  Mr. 
Casaubon,  who  bowed  his  head  towards  her,  while 
Mr.  Brooke  said,  smiling  nonchalantly,— 

"  Bless  me,  now,  how  different  people  are !  But 
you  had  a  bad  style  of  teaching,  you  know  —  else 
this  is  just  the  thing  for  girls  —  sketching,  fine  art, 
and  so  on.  But  you  took  to  drawing  plans ;  you 
don't  understand  morbidezza,  and  that  kind  of  thing. 


106  MIDDLEMARCH. 

You  will  come  to  my  house,  I  hope,  and  I  will  show 
you  what  I  did  in  this  way,"  he  continued,  turning 
to  young  Ladislaw,  who  had  to  be  recalled  from  his 
preoccupation  in  observing  Dorothea.  Ladislaw  had 
made  up  his  mind  that  she  must  be  an  unpleasant 
girl,  since  she  was  going  to  marry  Casaubon,  and 
what  she  said  of  her  stupidity  about  pictures  would 
have  confirmed  that  opinion  even  if  he  had  believed 
her.  As  it  was,  he  took  her  words  for  a  covert 
judgment,  and  was  certain  that  she  thought  his 
sketch  detestable.  There  was  too  much  cleverness 
in  her  apology :  she  was  laughing  both  at  her  uncle 
and  himself.  But  what  a  voice !  It  was  like  the 
voice  of  a  soul  that  had  once  lived  in  an  ^Eolian 
harp.  This  must  be  one  of  Nature's  inconsistencies. 
There  could  be  no  sort  of  passion  in  a  girl  who  would 
marry  Casaubon.  But  he  turned  from  her,  and 
bowed  his  thanks  for  Mr.  Brooke's  invitation. 

"We  will  turn  over  my  Italian  engravings  to- 
gether," continued  that  good-natured  man.  "  I  have 
no  end  of  those  things,  that  I  have  laid  by  for  years. 
One  gets  rusty  in  this  part  of  the  country,  you  know. 
Not  you,  Casaubon ;  you  stick  to  your  studies  ;  but 
my  best  ideas  get  undermost  —  out  of  use,  you  know. 
You  clever  young  men  must  guard  against  indolence. 
I  was  too  indolent,  you  know :  else  I  might  have 
been  anywhere  at  one  time." 

"That  is  a  seasonable  admonition,"  said  Mr. 
Casaubon ;  "  but  now  we  will  pass  on  to  the  house, 
lest  the  young  ladies  should  be  tired  of  standing." 

When  their  backs  were  turned,  young  Ladislaw 
sat  down  to  go  on  with  his  sketching,  and  as  he  did 
so  his  face  broke  into  an  expression  of  amusement 
which  increased  as  he  went  on  drawing,  till  at  last 
he  threw  back  his  head  and  laughed  aloud.  Partly 
it  was  the  reception  of  his  own  artistic  production 


MISS  BROOKE.  107 

that  tickled  him ;  partly  the  notion  of  his  grave 
cousin  as  the  lover  of  that  girl ;  and  partly  Mr. 
Brooke's  definition  of  the  place  he  might  have  held 
but  for  the  impediment  of  indolence.  Mr.  Will 
Ladislaw's  sense  of  the  ludicrous  lit  up  his  features 
very  agreeably  :  it  was  the  pure  enjoyment  of  comi- 
cality, and  had  no  mixture  of  sneering  and  self- 
exaltation. 

"  What  is  your  nephew  going  to  do  with  himself, 
Casaubon  ? "  said  Mr.  Brooke,  as  they  went  on. 

"  My  cousin,  you  mean,  —  not  my  nephew." 

"  Yes,  yes,  cousin.  But  in  the  way  of  a  career, 
you  know." 

"  The  answer  to  that  question  is  painfully  doubt- 
ful. On  leaving  Eugby  he  declined  to  go  to  an 
English  university,  where  I  would  gladly  have 
placed  him,  and  chose  what  I  must  consider  the 
anomalous  course  of  studying  at  Heidelberg.  And 
now  he  wants  to  go  abroad  again,  without  any 
special  object,  save  the  vague  purpose  of  what  he 
calls  culture,  preparation  for  he  knows  not  what. 
He  declines  to  choose  a  profession." 

"He  has  no  means  but  what  you  furnish,  I 
suppose." 

"  I  have  always  given  him  and  his  friends  reason 
to  understand  that  I  would  furnish  in  moderation 
what  was  necessary  for  providing  him  with  a  schol- 
arly education,  and  launching  him  respectably.  I 
am  therefore  bound  to  fulfil  the  expectation  so 
raised,"  said  Mr.  Casaubon,  putting  his  conduct 
in  the  light  of  mere  rectitude :  a  trait  of  delicacy 
which  Dorothea  noticed  with  admiration. 

"  He  has  a  thirst  for  travelling ;  perhaps  he  may 
turn  out  a  Bruce  or  a  Mungo  Park,"  said  Mr.  Brooke. 
"  I  had  a  notion  of  that  myself  at  one  time." 

"  No,  he  has  no  b«nt  towards  exploration,  or  the 


loS  MIDDLEMA.RCH. 

enlargement  of  our  geognosis :  that  would  be  a 
special  purpose  which  I  could  recognize  with  some 
approbation,  though  without  felicitating  him  on  a 
career  which  so  often  ends  in  premature  and  vio- 
lent death.  But  so  far  is  he  from  having  any  desire 
for  a  more  accurate  knowledge  of  the  earth's  sur- 
face, that  he  said  he  should  prefer  not  to  know  the 
sources  of  the  Nile,  and  that  there  should  be  some 
unknown  regions  preserved  as  hunting-grounds  for 
the  poetic  imagination." 

"Well,  there  is  something  in  that,  you  know," 
said  Mr.  Brooke,  who  had  certainly  an  impartial 
mind. 

"It  is,  I  fear,  nothing  more  than  a  part  of  his 
general  inaccuracy  and  indisposition  to  thorough- 
ness of  all  kinds,  which  would  be  a  bad  augury 
for  him  in  any  profession,  civil  or  sacred,  even  were 
he  so  far  submissive  to  ordinary  rule  as  to  choose 
one." 

"  Perhaps  he  has  conscientious  scruples  founded 
on  his  own  un fitness,"  said  Dorothea,  who  was 
interesting  herself  in  finding  a  favourable  expla- 
nation. "  Because  the  law  and  medicine  should  be 
very  serious  professions  to  undertake,  should  they 
not  ?  People's  lives  and  fortunes  depend  on  them." 

"  Doubtless ;  but  I  fear  that  my  young  relative 
Will  Ladislaw  is  chiefly  determined  in  his  aversion 
to  these  callings  by  a  dislike  to  steady  application, 
and  to  that  kind  of  acquirement  which  is  needful 
instrumentally,  but  is  not  charming  or  immediately 
inviting  to  self-indulgent  taste.  I  have  insisted  to 
him  on  what  Aristotle  has  stated  with  admirable 
brevity,  that  for  the  achievement  of  any  work 
regarded  as  an  end  there  must  be  a  prior  exer- 
cise of  many  energies  or  acquired  facilities  of  a 


MISS  BROOKE.  109 

secondary  order,  demanding  patience.  I  have 
pointed  to  my  own  manuscript  volumes,  which 
represent  the  toil  of  years  preparatory  to  a  work 
not  yet  accomplished.  But  in  vain.  To  careful 
reasoning  of  this  kind  he  replies  by  calling  him- 
self Pegasus,  and  every  form  of  prescribed  work 
'  harness.' " 

Celia  laughed.  She  was  surprised  to  find  that 
Mr.  Casaubon  could  say  something  quite  amusing. 

"  Well,  you  know,  he  may  turn  out  a  Byron,  a 
Chatterton,  a  Churchill  —  that  sort  of  thing  — 
there  's  no  telling,"  said  Mr.  Brooke.  "  Shall  you 
let  him  go  to  Italy,  or  wherever  else  he  wants 
to  go?" 

"  Yes  ;  I  have  agreed  to  furnish  him  with  moder- 
ate supplies  for  a  year  or  so;  he  asks  no  more.  I 
shall  let  him  be  tried  by  the  test  of  freedom." 

"  That  is  very  kind  of  you,"  said  Dorothea,  look- 
ing up  at  Mr.  Casaubon  with  delight.  "  It  is  noble. 
After  all,  people  may  really  have  in  them  some  voca- 
tion which  is  not  quite  plain  to  themselves,  may 
they  not  ?  They  may  seem  idle  and  weak  because 
they  are  growing.  We  should  be  very  patient  with 
each  other,  I  think." 

"  I  suppose  it  is  being  engaged  to  be  married  that 
has  made  you  think  patience  good,"  said  Celia,  as 
soon  as  she  and  Dorothea  were  alone  together, 
taking  off  their  wrappings. 

"  You  mean  that  I  am  very  impatient,  Celia." 

"  Yes ;  when  people  don't  do  and  say  just  what 
you  like."  Celia  had  become  less  afraid  of  "  saying 
things  "  to  Dorothea  since  this  engagement :  clever- 
ness seemed  to  her  more  pitiable  than  ever. 


CHAPTER  X. 

He  had  catched  a  great  cold,  had  he  had  no  other  clothes  to  wear 
than  the  skin  of  a  bear  not  yet  killed.  —  FULLER. 

YOUNG  Ladislaw  did  not  pay  that  visit  to  which 
Mr.  Brooke  had  invited  him,  and  only  six  days 
afterwards  Mr.  Casaubon  mentioned  that  his  young 
relative  had  started  for  the  Continent,  seeming  by 
this  cold  vagueness  to  waive  inquiry.  Indeed,  Will 
had  declined  to  fix  on  any  more  precise  destination 
than  the  entire  area  of  Europe.  Genius,  he  held, 
is  necessarily  intolerant  of  fetters :  on  the  one  hand 
it  must  have  the  utmost  play  for  its  spontaneity ; 
on  the  other,  it  may  confidently  await  those  mes- 
sages from  the  universe  which  summon  it  to  its 
peculiar  work,  only  placing  itself  in  an  attitude 
of  receptivity  towards  all  sublime  chances.  The 
attitudes  of  receptivity  are  various,  and  Will  had 
sincerely  tried  many  of  them.  He  was  not  exces- 
sively fond  of  wine,  but  he  had  several  times  taken 
too  much,  simply  as  an  experiment  in  that  form  of 
ecstasy ;  he  had  fasted  till  he  was  faint,  and  then 
supped  on  lobster;  he  had  made  himself  ill  with 
doses  of  opium.  Nothing  greatly  original  had  re- 
sulted from  these  measures ;  and  the  effects  of  the 
opium  had  convinced  him  that  there  was  an  en- 
tire dissimilarity  between  his  constitution  and  De 
Quincey's.  The  superadded  circumstance  which 
would  evolve  the  genius  had  not  yet  corne ;  the 
universe  had  not  yet  beckoned.  Even  Caesar's 


MISS  BROOKE.  in 

fortune  at  one  time  was  but  a  grand  presentiment. 
We  know  what  a  masquerade  all  development  is, 
and  what  effective  shapes  may  be  disguised  in  help- 
less embryos.  In  fact,  the  world  is  full  of  hopeful 
analogies  and  handsome  dubious  eggs  called  possi- 
bilities. Will  saw  clearly  enough  the  pitiable 
instances  of  long  incubation  producing  no  chick, 
and  but  for  gratitude  would  have  laughed  at  Casau- 
bon,  whose  plodding  application,  rows  of  note-books, 
and  small  taper  of  learned  theory  exploring  the 
tossed  ruins  of  the  world,  seemed  to  enforce  a 
moral  entirely  encouraging  to  Will's  generous 
reliance  on  the  intentions  of  the  universe  with 
regard  to  himself.  He  held  that  reliance  to  be  a 
mark  of  genius ;  and  certainly  it  is  no  mark  to 
the  contrary :  genius  consisting  neither  in  self- 
conceit  nor  in  humility,  but  in  a  power  to  make 
or  do,  not  anything  in  general,  but  something  in 
particular.  Let  him  start  for  the  Continent,  then, 
without  our  pronouncing  on  his  future.  Among  all 
forms  of  mistake,  prophecy  is  the  most  gratuitous. 

But  at  present  this  caution  against  a  too  hasty 
judgment  interests  me  more  in  relation  to  Mr. 
Casaubon  than  to  his  young  cousin.  If  to  Doro- 
thea Mr.  Casaubon  had  been  the  mere  occasion 
which  had  set  alight  the  fine  inflammable  material 
of  her  youthful  illusions,  does  it  follow  that  he  was 
fairly  represented  in  the  minds  of  those  less  impas- 
sioned personages  who  have  hitherto  delivered  their 
judgments  concerning  him  ?  I  protest  against  any 
absolute  conclusion,  any  prejudice  derived  from 
Mrs.  Cadwallader's  contempt  for  a  neighbouring 
clergyman's  alleged  greatness  of  soul,  or  Sir  James 
Chettam's  poor  opinion  of  his  rival's  legs,  —  from 
Mr.  Brooke's  failure  to  elicit  a  companion's  ideas, 


ii2  MIDDLEMARCH. 

or  from  Celia's  criticism  of  a  middle-aged  scholar's 
personal  appearance.  I  am  not  sure  that  the  great- 
est man  of  his  age,  if  ever  that  solitary  superlative 
existed,  could  escape  these  unfavourable  reflections 
of  himself  in  various  small  mirrors  ;  and  even  Milton, 
looking  for  his  portrait  in  a  spoon,  must  submit  to 
have  the  facial  angle  of  a  bumpkin.  Moreover,  if 
Mr.  Casaubon,  speaking  for  himself,  has  rather  a 
chilling  rhetoric,  it  is  not  therefore  certain  that 
there  is  no  good  work  or  fine  feeling  in  him.  Did 
not  an  immortal  physicist  and  interpreter  of  hiero- 
glyphs write  detestable  verses?  Has  the  theory 
of  the  solar  system  been  advanced  by  graceful  man- 
ners and  conversational  tact  ?  Suppose  we  turn  from 
outside  estimates  of  a  man,  to  wonder,  with  keener 
interest,  what  is  the  report  of  his  own  consciousness 
about  his  doings  or  capacity :  with  what  hindrances 
he  is  carrying  on  his  daily  labours ;  what  fading  of 
hopes,  or  what  deeper  fixity  of  self-delusion  the 
years  are  marking  off  within  him ;  and  with  what 
spirit  he  wrestles  against  universal  pressure,  which 
will  one  day  be  too  heavy  for  him,  and  bring  his 
heart  to  its  final  pause.  Doubtless  his  lot  is  im- 
portant in  his  own  eyes  ;  and  the  chief  reason  that 
we  think  he  asks  too  large  a  place  in  our  considera- 
tion must  be  our  want  of  room  for  him,  since 
we  refer  him  to  the  Divine  regard  with  perfect 
confidence;  nay,  it  is  even  held  sublime  for  our 
neighbour  to  expect  the  utmost  there,  however 
little  he  may  have  got  from  us.  Mr.  Casaubon, 
too,  was  the  centre  of  his  own  world ;  if  he  was 
liable  to  think  that  others  were  providentially 
made  for  him,  and  especially  to  consider  them  in 
the  light  of  their  fitness  for  the  author  of  a  "Key 
to  all  Mythologies,"  this  trait  is  not  quite  alien  to 


MISS  BROOKE.  113 

us,  and  like  the  other  mendicant  hopes  of  mortals, 
claims  some  of  our  pity. 

Certainly  this  affair  of  his  marriage  with  Miss 
Brooke  touched  him  more  nearly  than  it  did  any 
one  of  the  persons  who  have  hitherto  shown  their 
disapproval  of  it,  and  in  the  present  stage  of  things 
I  feel  more  tenderly  towards  his  experience  of 
success  than  towards  the  disappointment  of  the 
amiable  Sir  James.  For  in  truth,  as  the  day  fixed 
for  his  marriage  came  nearer,  Mr.  Casaubon  did  not 
find  his  spirits  rising ;  nor  did  the  contemplation  of 
that  matrimonial  garden-scene,  where,  as  all  ex- 
perience showed,  the  path  was  to  be  bordered  with 
flowers,  prove  persistently  more  enchanting  to  him 
than  the  accustomed  vaults  where  he  walked  taper 
in  hand.  He  did  not  confess  to  himself,  still  less 
could  he  have  breathed  to  another,  his  surprise  that 
though  he  had  won  a  lovely  and  noble-hearted  girl  he 
had  not  won  delight,  —  which  he  had  also  regarded 
as  an  object  to  be  found  by  search.  It  is  true  that 
he  knew  all  the  classical  passages  implying  the  con- 
trary ;  but  knowing  classical  passages,  we  find,  is  a 
mode  of  motion,  which  explains  why  they  leave  so 
little  extra  force  for  their  personal  application. 

Poor  Mr.  Casaubon  had  imagined  that  his  long 
studious  bachelorhood  had  stored  up  for  him  a  com- 
pound interest  of  enjoyment,  and  that  large  drafts 
on  his  affections  would  not  fail  to  be  honoured ;  for 
we  all  of  us,  grave  or  light,  get  our  thoughts  en- 
tangled in  metaphors,  and  act  fatally  on  the  strength 
of  them.  And  now  he  was  in  danger  of  being 
saddened  by  the  very  conviction  that  his  circum- 
stances were  unusually  happy :  there  was  nothing 
external  by  which  he  could  account  for  a  certain 
blankness  of  sensibility  which  came  over  him  just 
VOL.  i.  —  8 


H4  M1DDLEMARCH. 

when  his  expectant  gladness  should  have  been  most 
lively,  just  when  he  exchanged  the  accustomed 
dulness  of  his  Lowick  library  for  his  visits  to  the 
Grange.  Here  was  a  weary  experience  in  which  he 
was  as  utterly  condemned  to  loneliness  as  in  the 
despair  which  sometimes  threatened  him  while  toil- 
ing in  the  morass  of  authorship  without  seeming 
nearer  to  the  goal.  And  his  was  that  worst  loneli- 
ness which  would  shrink  from  sympathy.  He  could 
not  but  wish  that  Dorothea  should  think  him  not 
less  happy  than  the  world  would  expect  her  success- 
ful suitor  to  be ;  and  in  relation  to  his  authorship 
he  leaned  on  her  young  trust  and  veneration,  he 
liked  to  draw  forth  her  fresh  interest  in  listening, 
as  a  means  of  encouragement  to  himself  :  in  talking1 
to  her  he  presented  all  his  performance  and  inten- 
tion with  the  reflected  confidence  of  the  pedagogue, 
and  rid  himself  for  the  time  of  that  chilling  ideal 
audience  which  crowded  his  laborious  uncroative 
hours  with  the  vaporous  pressure  of  Tartarean  shades. 
For  to  Dorothea,  after  that  toy -box  history  of  the 
world  adapted  to  young  ladies  which  had  made  the 
chief  part  of  her  education,  Mr.  Casaubon's  talk 
about  his  great  book  was  full  of  new  vistas ;  and 
this  sense  of  revelation,  this  surprise  of  a  nearer 
introduction  to  Stoics  and  Alexandrians,  as  people 
who  had  ideas  not  totally  unlike  her  own,  kept  in 
abeyance  for  the  time  her  usual  eagerness  for  a 
binding  theory  which  could  bring  her  own  life  and 
doctrine  into  strict  connection  with  that  amazing 
past,  and  give  the  remotest  sources  of  knowledge 
some  bearing  on  her  actions.  That  more  complete 
teaching  would  come  —  Mr.  Casaubon  would  tell 
her  all  that :  she  was  looking  forward  to  higher  ini- 
tiation in  ideas,  as  she  was  looking  forward  to  mar- 


MISS  BROOKE.  115 

riage,  and  blending  her  dim  conceptions  of  both.  It 
would  be  a  great  mistake  to  suppose  that  Dorothea 
would  have  cared  about  any  share  in  Mr.  Casaubon's 
learning  as  mere  accomplishment ;  for  though  opin- 
ion in  the  neighbourhood  of  Freshitt  and  Tipton 
had  pronounced  her  clever,  that  epithet  would  not 
have  described  her  to  circles  in  whose  more  precise 
vocabulary  cleverness  implies  mere  aptitude  for 
knowing  and  doing,  apart  from  character.  All  her 
eagerness  for  acquirement  lay  within  that  full  cur- 
rent of  sympathetic  motive  in  which  her  ideas  and 
impulses  were  habitually  swept  along.  She  did  not 
want  to  deck  herself  with  knowledge,  —  to  wear  it 
loose  from  the  nerves  and  blood  that  fed  her  action ; 
and  if  she  had  written  a  book  she  must  have  done 
it  as  Saint  Theresa  did,  under  the  command  of  an 
authority  that  constrained  her  conscience.  But 
something  she  yearned  for  by  which  her  life  might 
be  filled  with  action  at  once  rational  and  ardent; 
and  since  the  time  was  gone  by  for  guiding  visions 
and  spiritual  directors,  since  prayer  heightened 
yearning  but  not  instruction,  what  lamp  was  there 
but  knowledge  ?  Surely  learned  men  kept  the  only 
oil ;  and  who  more  learned  than  Mr.  Casaubon  ? 

Thus  in  these  brief  weeks  Dorothea's  joyous 
grateful  expectation  was  unbroken,  and  however 
her  lover  might  occasionally  be  conscious  of  flat- 
ness, he  could  never  refer  it  to  any  slackening  of 
her  affectionate  interest. 

The  season  was  mild  enough  to  encourage  the 
project  of  extending  the  wedding  journey  as  far  as 
Rome,  and  Mr.  Casaubon  was  anxious  for  this 
because  he  wished  to  inspect  some  manuscripts  in 
the  Vatican: 

"  I  still  regret  that  your  sister  is  not  to  accompany 


n6  MIDDLEMAKCH. 

us,"  he  said  one  morning,  some  time  after  it  had 
been  ascertained  that  Celia  objected  to  go,  and  that 
Dorothea  did  not  wish  for  her  companionship.  "  You 
will  have  many  lonely  hours,  Dorothea,  for  I  shall 
be  constrained  to  make  the  utmost  use  of  my  time 
during  our  stay  in  Rome,  and  I  should  feel  more  at 
liberty  if  you  had  a  companion." 

The  words  "  I  should  feel  more  at  liberty  "  grated 
on  Dorothea.  For  the  first  time  in  speaking  to  Mr. 
Casaubon  she  coloured  from  annoyance. 

"  You  must  have  misunderstood  me  very  much," 
she  said,  "  if  you  think  I  should  not  enter  into  the 
value  of  your  time,  —  if  you  think  that  I  should  not 
willingly  give  up  whatever  interfered  with  your 
using  it  to  the  best  purpose." 

"  That  is  very  amiable  in  you,  my  dear  Dorothea," 
said  Mr.  Casaubon,  not  in  the  least  noticing  that 
she  was  hurt ;  "  but  if  you  had  a  lady  as  your  com- 
panion, I  could  put  you  both  under  the  care  of  a 
cicerone,  and  we  could  thus  achieve  two  purposes 
in  the  same  space  of  time." 

"I  beg  you  will  not  refer  to  this  again,"  said 
Dorothea,  rather  haughtily.  But  immediately  she 
feared  that  she  was  wrong,  and  turning  towards  him 
she  laid  her  hand  on  his,  adding  in  a  different  tone : 
"  Pray  do  not  be  anxious  about  me.  I  shall  have 
so  much  to  think  of  when  I  am  alone.  And  Tan- 
tripp  will  be  a  sufficient  companion,  just  to  take 
care  of  me.  I  could  not  bear  to  have  Celia :  she 
would  be  miserable." 

It  was  time  to  dress.  There  was  to  be  a  dinner- 
party that  day,  the  last  of  the  parties  which  were 
held  at  the  Grange  as  proper  preliminaries  to  the 
wedding,  and  Dorothea  was  glad  of  a  reason  for 
moving  away  at  once  on  the  sound  of  the  bell,  as  if 


MISS  BROOKE.  117 

she  needed  more  than  her  usual  amount  of  prepa- 
ration. She  was  ashamed  of  being  irritated  from 
some  cause  she  could  not  define  even  to  herself ; 
for  though  she  had  no  intention  to  be  untruthful, 
her  reply  had  not  touched  the  real  hurt  within  her. 
Mr.  Casaubon's  words  had  been  quite  reasonable, 
yet  they  had  brought  a  vague  instantaneous  sense 
of  aloofness  on  his  part. 

"  Surely  I  am  in  a  strangely  selfish  weak  state  of 
mind,"  she  said  to  herself.  "How  can  I  have  a 
husband  who  is  so  much  above  me  without  know- 
ing that  he  needs  me  less  than  I  need  him  ? " 

Having  convinced  herself  that  Mr.  Casaubon  was 
altogether  right,  she  recovered  her  equanimity,  and 
was  an  agreeable  image  of  serene  dignity  when  she 
came  into  the  drawing-room  in  her  silver-gray  dress, 
—  the  simple  lines  of  her  dark-brown  hair  parted 
over  her  brow  and  coiled  massively  behind,  in  keep- 
ing with  the  entire  absence  from  her  manner  and 
expression  of  all  search  after  mere  effect.  Some- 
times when  Dorothea  was  in  company,  there  seemed 
to  be  as  complete  an  air  of  repose  about  her  as  if 
she  had  been  a  picture  of  Santa  Barbara  looking  out 
from  her  tower  into  the  clear  air ;  but  these  inter- 
vals of  quietude  made  the  energy  of  her  speech  and 
emotion  the  more  remarked  when  some  outward 
appeal  had  touched  her. 

She  was  naturally  the  subject  of  many  observa- 
tions this  evening,  for  the  dinner-party  was  large 
and  rather  more  miscellaneous  as  to  the  male 
portion  than  any  which  had  been  held  at  the 
Grange  since  Mr.  Brooke's  nieces  had  resided  with 
him,  so  that  the  talking  was  done  in  duos  and  trios 
more  or  less  inharmonious.  There  was  the  newly 
elected  mayor  of  Middlemarch,  who  happened  to 


n8  MIDDLED  AKCII. 

be  a  manufacturer;  the  philanthropic  banker  his 
brother-in-law,  who  predominated  so  much  in  the 
town  that  some  called  him  a  Methodist,  others  a 
hypocrite,  according  to  the  resources  of  their  vo- 
cabulary ;  and  there  were  various  professional  men. 
In  fact,  Mrs.  Cadwallader  said  that  Brooke  was 
beginning  to  treat  the  Middlemarchers,  and  that 
she  preferred  the  farmers  at  the  tithe-dinner,  who 
drank  her  health  unpretentiously,  and  were  not 
ashamed  of  their  grandfathers'  furniture.  For  in 
that  part  of  the  country,  before  Eeform  had  done  its 
notable  part  in  developing  the  political  conscious- 
ness, there  was  a  clearer  distinction  of  ranks  and  a 
dimmer  distinction  of  parties ;  so  that  Mr.  Brooke's 
miscellaneous  invitations  seemed  to  belong  to  that 
general  laxity  which  came  from  his  inordinate  travel 
and  habit  of  taking  too  much  in  the  form  of  ideas. 

Already,  as  Miss  Brooke  passed  out  of  the  dining- 
room,  opportunity  was  found  for  some  interjectioual 
"  asides." 

"  A  fine  woman,  Miss  Brooke  !  an  uncommonly 
fine  woman,  by  God  ! "  said  Mr.  Standish,  the  old 
lawyer,  who  had  been  so  long  concerned  with  the 
landed  gentry  that  he  had  become  landed  himself, 
and  used  that  oath  in  a  deep-mouthed  manner  as  a 
sort  of  armorial  bearings,  stamping  the  speech  of  a 
man  who  held  a  good  position. 

Mr.  Bulstrode,  the  banker,  seemed  to  be  addressed, 
but  that  gentleman  disliked  coarseness  and  profanity, 
and  merely  bowed.  The  remark  was  taken  up  by 
Mr.  Chichely,  a  middle-aged  bachelor  and  coursing 
celebrity,  who  had  a  complexion  something  like  an 
Easter  egg,  a  few  hairs  carefully  arranged,  and  a 
carriage  implying  the  consciousness  of  a  distin- 
guished appearance. 


MISS  BROOKE.  119 

"  Yes,  but  not  my  style  of  woman :  I  like  a 
woman  who  lays  herself  out  a  little  more  to  please 
us.  There  should  be  a  little  filigree  about  a  woman, 
—  something  of  the  coquette.  A  man  likes  a  sort 
of  challenge.  The  more  of  a  dead  set  she  makes  at 
you  the  better." 

"  There  's  some  truth  in  that,"  said  Mr.  Standish, 
disposed  to  be  genial.  "  And,  by  God,  it 's  usually 
the  way  with  them.  I  suppose  it  answers  some  wise 
ends  :  Providence  made  them  so,  eh,  Bulstrode  ? " 

"  I  should  be  disposed  to  refer  coquetry  to  another 
source,"  said  Mr.  Bulstrode.  "  I  should  rather  refer 
it  to  the  devil." 

"Ay,  to  be  sure,  there  should  be  a  little  devil  in 
a  woman,"  said  Mr.  Chichely,  whose  study  of  the 
fair  sex  seemed  to  have  been  detrimental  to  his 
theology.  "And  I  like  them  blond,  with  a  cer- 
tain gait,  and  a  swan  neck.  Between  ourselves, 
the  mayor's  daughter  is  more  to  my  taste  than  Miss 
Brooke  or  Miss  Celia  either.  If  I  were  a  marrying 
man  I  should  choose  Miss  Vincy  before  either  of 
them." 

"  Well,  make  up,  make  up,"  said  Mr.  Standish, 
jocosely ;  "  you  see  the  middle-aged  fellows  carry 
the  day." 

Mr.  Chichely  shook  his  head  with  much  meaning  : 
he  was  not  going  to  incur  the  certainty  of  being 
accepted  by  the  woman  he  would  choose. 

The  Miss  Vincy  who  had  the  honour  of  being 
Mr.  Chichely's  ideal  was  of  course  not  present ;  for 
Mr.  Brooke,  always  objecting  to  go  too  far,  would 
not  have  chosen  that  his  nieces  should  meet  the 
daughter  of  a  Middlemarch  manufacturer,  unless 
it  were  on  a  public  occasion.  The  feminine  part 
of  the  company  included  none  whom  Lady  Chot- 


120  MIDDLEMARCH. 

tarn  or  Mrs.  Cad  wall  ader  could  object  to;  for  Mrs. 
Eeufrew,  the  colonel's  widow,  was  not  only  unex- 
ceptionable in  point  of  breeding,  but  also  interest- 
ing on  the  ground  of  her  complaint,  which  puzzled 
the  doctors,  and  seemed  clearly  a  case  wherein  the 
fulness  of  professional  knowledge  might  need  the 
supplement  of  quackery.  Lady  Chettam,  who  at- 
tributed her  own  remarkable  health  to  home-made 
bitters  united  with  constant  medical  attendance, 
entered  with  much  exercise  of  the  imagination  in- 
to Mrs.  Kenfrew's  account  of  symptoms,  and  into 
the  amazing  futility  in  her  case  of  all  strengthen- 
ing medicines. 

"Where  can  all  the  strength  of  those  medicines 
go,  my  dear  ? "  said  the  mild  but  stately  dowager, 
turning  to  Mrs.  Cadwallader  reflectively,  when  Mrs. 
Renfrew's  attention  was  called  away. 

"  It  strengthens  the  disease,"  said  the  Rector's 
wife,  much  too  well-born  not  to  be  an  amateur  in 
medicine.  "  Everything  depends  on  the  constitu- 
tion :  some  people  make  fat,  some  blood,  and  some 
bile,  —  that 's  my  view  of  the  matter ;  and  what- 
ever they  take  is  a  sort  of  grist  to  the  mill." 

"  Then  she  ought  to  take  medicines  that  would 
reduce,  —  reduce  the  disease,  you  know,  if  you  are 
right,  my  dear.  And  I  think  what  you  say  is 
reasonable." 

"  Certainly  it  is  reasonable.  You  have  two  sorts 
of  potatoes,  fed  on  the  same  soil.  One  of  them 
grows  more  and  more  watery  — 

"  Ah  !  like  this  poor  Mrs.  Renfrew  —  that  is  what 
I  think.  Dropsy  !  There  is  no  swelling  yet,  —  it 
is  inward.  I  should  say  she  ought  to  take  drying 
medicines,  should  n't  you  ?  —  or  a  dry  hot-air  bath. 
Many  things  might  be  tried  of  a  drying  nature." 


MISS  BROOKE.  121 

"  Let  her  try  a  certain  person's  pamphlets,"  said 
Mrs.  Cadwallader  in  an  undertone,  seeing  the 
gentlemen  enter.  "  He  does  not  want  drying." 

"  Who,  my  dear  ? "  said  Lady  Chettam,  a  charm- 
ing woman,  not  so  quick  as  to  nullify  the  pleasure 
of  explanation. 

"The  bridegroom,  —  Casaubon.  He  has  certainly 
been  drying  up  faster  since  the  engagement:  the 
flame  of  passion,  I  suppose." 

"  I  should  think  he  is  far  from  having  a  good  con- 
stitution," said  Lady  Chettam,  with  a  still  deeper 
undertone.  "  And  then  his  studies,  —  so  very  dry, 
as  you  say." 

"  Eeally,  by  the  side  of  Sir  James,  he  looks  like 
a  death's  head  skinned  over  for  the  occasion.  Mark 
my  words :  in  a  year  from  this  time  that  girl  will 
hate  him.  She  looks  up  to  him  as  an  oracle  now, 
and  by  and  by  she  will  be  at  the  other  extreme. 
All  flightiness  ! " 

"  How  very  shocking  !  I  fear  she  is  headstrong. 
But  tell  me  —  you  know  all  about  him  —  is  there 
anything  very  bad  ?  What  is  the  truth  ?  " 

"  The  truth  ?  He  is  as  bad  as  the  wrong  physic,  — 
nasty  to  take,  and  sure  to  disagree." 

"  There  could  not  be  anything  worse  than  that," 
said  Lady  Chettam,  with  so  vivid  a  conception  of 
the  physic  that  she  seemed  to  have  learned  some- 
thing exact  about  Mr.  Casaubon's  disadvantages. 
"However,  James  will  hear  nothing  against  Miss 
Brooke.  He  says  she  is  the  mirror  of  women  still." 

"  That  is  a  generous  make-believe  of  his.  Depend 
upon  it,  he  likes  little  Celia  better,  and  she  appre- 
ciates him.  I  hope  you  like  my  little  Celia  ? " 

"  Certainly ;  she  is  fonder  of  geraniums,  and 
seems  more  docile,  though  not  so  fine  a  figure. 


122  MIDDLEMARCH. 

But  we  were  talking  of  physic ;  tell  me  about 
this  new  young  surgeon,  Mr.  Lydgate.  I  am  told 
he  is  wonderfully  clever :  he  certainly  looks  it,  — 
a  fine  brow  indeed." 

"  He  is  a  gentleman.  I  heard  him  talking  to 
Humphrey.  He  talks  well." 

"  Yes.  Mr.  Brooke  says  he  is  one  of  the  Lyd- 
gates  of  Northumberland,  really  well  connected. 
One  does  not  expect  it  in  a  practitioner  of  that 
kind.  For  my  own  part,  I  like  a  medical  man  more 
on  a  footing  with  the  servants ;  they  are  often  all 
the  cleverer.  I  assure  you  I  found  poor  Hicks's 
judgment  unfailing  ;  I  never  knew  him  wrong.  He 
was  coarse  and  butcher-like,  but  he  knew  my  con- 
stitution. It  was  a  loss  to  me,  his  going  off  so 
suddenly.  Dear  me,  what  a  very  animated  con- 
versation Miss  Brooke  seems  to  be  having  with 
this  Mr.  Lydgate  !  " 

"  She  is  talking  cottages  and  hospitals  with  him," 
said  Mrs.  Cadwallader,  whose  ears  and  power  of 
interpretation  were  quick.  "  I  believe  he  is  a  sort 
of  philanthropist,  so  Brooke  is  sure  to  take  him 
up." 

"  James,"  said  Lady  Chettam  when  her  son  came 
near,  "  bring  Mr.  Lydgate  and  introduce  him  to  me. 
I  want  to  test  him." 

The  affable  dowager  declared  herself  delighted 
with  this  opportunity  of  making  Mr.  Lydgate's 
acquaintance,  having  heard  of  his  success  in  treat- 
ing fever  on  a  new  plan. 

Mr.  Lydgate  had  the  medical  accomplishment  of 
looking  perfectly  grave  whatever  nonsense  was 
talked  to  him,  and  his  dark  steady  eyes  gave  him 
impressiveness  as  a  listener.  He  was  as  little  as 
possible  like  the  lamented  Hicks,  especially  in  a 


MISS  BROOKE.  123 

certain  careless  refinement  about  his  toilet  and 
utterance.  Yet  Lady  Chettam  gathered  much  con- 
fidence in  him.  He  confirmed  her  view  of  her 
own  constitution  as  being  peculiar,  by  admitting 
that  all  constitutions  might  be  called  peculiar,  and 
he  did  not  deny  that  hers  might  be  more  peculiar 
than  others.  He  did  not  approve  of  a  too  lowering 
system,  including  reckless  cupping,  nor,  on  the  other 
hand,  of  incessant  port-wine  and  bark.  He  said  "  I 
think  so  "  with  an  air  of  so  much  deference  accomr 
panying  the  insight  of  agreement,  that  she  formed 
the  most  cordial  opinion  of  his  talents. 

"  I  am  quite  pleased  with  your  protege, "  she  said 
to  Mr.  Brooke  before  going  away. 

"  My  protege  ?  —  dear  me  !  —  who  is  that  ?  "  said 
Mr.  Brooke. 

"  This  young  Lydgate,  the  new  doctor.  He  seems 
to  me  to  understand  his  profession  admirably.  " 

"  Oh,  Lydgate !  he  is  not  my  protege,  you  know ; 
only  I  knew  an  uncle  of  his  who  sent  me  a  letter 
about  him.  However,  I  think  he  is  likely  to  be 
first-rate,  —  has  studied  in  Paris,  knew  Brous- 
sais ;  has  ideas,  you  know,  —  wants  to  raise  the 
profession. " 

"  Lydgate  has  lots  of  ideas,  quite  new,  about 
ventilation  and  diet,  that  sort  of  thing, "  resumed 
Mr.  Brooke,  after  he  had  handed  out  Lady  Chet- 
tam, and  had  returned  to  be  civil  to  a  group  of 
Middlemarchers. 

"  Hang  it !  do  you  think  that  is  quite  sound  ? 
—  upsetting  the  old  treatment,  which  has  made 
Englishmen  what  they  are  ?  "  said  Mr.  Standish. 

"  Medical  knowledge  is  at  a  low  ebb  among  us, " 
said  Mr.  Bulstrode,  who  spoke  in  a  subdued  tone, 
and  had  rather  a  sickly  air.  "  I,  for  my  part,  hail 


124  MIDDLEMARCH. 

the  advent  of  Mr.  Lydgate.  I  hope  to  find  good 
reason  for  confiding  the  new  hospital  to  his 
management. " 

"That  is  all  very  fine,"  replied  Mr.  Standish, 
who  was  not  fond  of  Mr.  Bulstrode ;  "  if  you  like 
him  to  try  experiments  on  your  hospital  patients, 
and  kill  a  few  people  for  charity,  I  have  no  objec- 
tion. But  I  am  not  going  to  hand  money  out  of 
my  purse  to  have  experiments  tried  on  me.  I  like 
treatment  that  has  been  tested  a  little.  " 

"  Well,  you  know,  Standish,  every  dose  you  take 
is  an  experiment,  —  an  experiment,  you  know, " 
said  Mr.  Brooke,  nodding  towards  the  lawyer. 

"  Oh,  if  you  talk  in  that  sense ! "  said  Mr. 
Standish,  with  as  much  disgust  at  such  non-legal 
quibbling  as  a  man  can  well  betray  towards  a 
valuable  client. 

"  I  should  be  glad  of  any  treatment  that  would 
cure  me  without  reducing  me  to  a  skeleton,  like 
poor  Grainger,"  said  Mr.  Vincy,  the  mayor,  a 
florid  man,  who  would  have  served  for  a  study  of 
flesh  in  striking  contrast  with  the  Franciscan  tints 
of  Mr.  Bulstrode.  "  It 's  an  uncommonly  danger- 
ous thing  to  be  left  without  any  padding  against 
the  shafts  of  disease,  as  somebody  said,  —  and  I 
think  it  a  very  good  expression  myself. " 

Mr.  Lydgate,  of  course,  was  out  of  hearing.  He 
had  quitted  the  party  early,  and  would  have 
thought  it  altogether  tedious  but  for  the  novelty 
of  certain  introductions,  especially  the  introduc- 
tion to  Miss  Brooke,  whose  youthful  bloom,  with 
her  approaching  marriage  to  that  faded  scholar, 
and  her  interest  in  matters  socially  useful,  gave 
her  the  piquancy  of  an  unusual  combination. 

"  She  is  a  good  creature  —  that  fine  girl  —  but  a 


MISS  BROOKE.  125 

little  too  earnest, "  he  thought.  "  It  is  troublesome 
to  talk  to  such  women.  They  are  always  wanting 
reasons,  yet  they  are  too  ignorant  to  understand  the 
merits  of  any  question,  and  usually  fall  back  on 
their  moral  sense  to  settle  things  after  their  own 
taste. " 

Evidently  Miss  Brooke  was  not  Mr.  Lydgate's 
style  of  woman  any  more  than  Mr.  Chichely's. 
Considered,  indeed,  in  relation  to  the  latter,  whose 
mind  was  matured,  she  was  altogether  a  mistake, 
and  calculated  to  shock  his  trust  in  final  causes, 
including  the  adaptation  of  fine  young  women  to 
purple -faced  bachelors.  But  Lydgate  was  less  ripe, 
and  might  possibly  have  experience  before  him 
which  would  modify  his  opinion  as  to  the  most 
excellent  things  in  woman. 

Miss  Brooke,  however,  was  not  again  seen  by 
either  of  these  gentlemen  under  her  maiden  name. 
Not  long  after  that  dinner-party  she  had  become 
Mrs.  Casaubon,  and  was  on  her  way  to  Eome. 


CHAPTER  XL 

But  deeds  and  language  such  as  men  do  use, 
And  persons  such  as  comedy  would  choose, 
When  she  would  show  an  image  of  the  times, 
And  sport  with  human  follies,  not  with  crimes. 

BEN  JONSON. 

LYDGATE,  in  fact,  was  already  conscious  of  being 
fascinated  by  a  woman  strikingly  different  from 
Miss  Brooke :  he  did  not  in  the  least  suppose  that 
he  had  lost  his  balance  and  fallen  in  love,  but  he 
had  said  of  that  particular  woman,  "  She  is  grace 
itself;  she  is  perfectly  lovely  and  accomplished. 
That  is  what  a  woman  ought  to  be :  she  ought  to 
produce  the  effect  of  exquisite  music. "  Plain 
women  he  regarded  as  he  did  the  other  severe  facts 
of  life,  to  be  faced  with  philosophy  and  investi- 
gated by  science.  But  Rosamond  Vincy  seemed  to 
have  the  true  melodic  charm ;  and  when  a  man 
has  seen  the  woman  whom  he  would  have  chosen 
if  he  had  intended  to  marry  speedily,  his  remain- 
ing a  bachelor  will  usually  depend  on  her  resolu- 
tion rather  than  on  his.  Lydgate  believed  that  he 
should  not  marry  for  several  years :  not  marry 
until  he  had  trodden  out  a  good  clear  path  for 
himself  away  from  the  broad  road  which  was  quite 
ready  made.  He  had  seen  Miss  Vincy  above  his 
horizon  almost  as  long  as  it  had  taken  Mr.  Casaubon 
to  become  engaged  and  married  :  but  this  learned  gen- 
tleman was  possessed  of  a  fortune ;  he  had  assem- 
bled his  voluminous  notes,  aud  had  made  that  sort 


MISS  BROOKE.  127 

of  reputation  which  precedes  performance,  —  often 
the  larger  part  of  a  man's  fame.  He  took  a  wife, 
as  we  have  seen,  to  adorn  the  remaining  quadrant 
of  his  course,  and  be  a  little  moon  that  would 
cause  hardly  a  calculable  perturbation.  But  Lyd- 
gate  was  young,  poor,  ambitious.  He  had  his 
half-century  before  him  instead  of  behind  him, 
and  he  had  come  to  Middlemarch  bent  on  doing 
many  things  that  were  not  directly  fitted  to  make 
his  fortune  or  even  secure  him  a  good  income.  To 
a  man  under  such  circumstances,  taking  a  wife  is 
something  more  than  a  question  of  adornment, 
however  highly  he  may  rate  this ;  and  Lydgate 
was  disposed  to  give  it  the  first  place  among  wifely 
functions.  To  his  taste,  guided  by  a  single  con- 
versation, here  was  the  point  on  which  Miss 
Brooke  would  be  found  wanting,  notwithstanding 
her  undeniable  beauty.  She  did  not  look  at  things 
from  the  proper  feminine  angle.  The  society  of 
such  women  was  about  as  relaxing  as  going  from 
your  work  to  teach  the  second  form,  instead  of 
reclining  in  a  paradise  with  sweet  laughs  for  bird- 
notes,  and  blue  eyes  for  a  heaven. 

Certainly  nothing  at  present  could  seem  much 
less  important  to  Lydgate  than  the  turn  of  Miss 
Brooke's  mind,  or  to  Miss  Brooke  than  the  quali- 
ties of  the  woman  who  had  attracted  this  young 
surgeon.  But  any  one  watching  keenly  the  stealthy 
convergence  of  human  lots,  sees  a  slow  preparation 
of  effects  from  one  life  on  another,,  which  tells  like 
a  calculated  irony  on  the  indifference  or  the  frozen 
stare  with  which  we  look  at  our  unintroduced 
neighbour.  Destiny  stands  by  sarcastic  with  our 
dramatis  personce  folded  in  her  hand. 

Old    provincial   society   had    its    share   of   this 


128  MIDDLEMARCH. 

subtle  movement:  had  not  only  its  striking  down- 
falls, its  brilliant  young  professional  dandies  who 
ended  by  living  up  an  entry  with  a  drab  and  six 
children  for  their  establishment,  but  also  those 
less  marked  vicissitudes  which  are  constantly 
shifting  the  boundaries  of  social  intercourse,  and 
begetting  new  consciousness  of  interdependence. 
Some  slipped  a  little  downward,  some  got  higher 
footing :  people  denied  aspirates,  gained  wealth, 
and  fastidious  gentlemen  stood  for  boroughs ;  some 
were  caught  in  political  currents,  some  in  ecclesi- 
astical, and  perhaps  found  themselves  surprisingly 
grouped  in  consequence ;  while  a  few  personages 
or  families  that  stood  with  rocky  firmness  amid  all 
this  fluctuation,  were  slowly  presenting  new  aspects 
in  spite  of  solidity,  and  altering  with  the  double 
change  of  self  and  beholder.  Municipal  town  and 
rural  parish  gradually  made  fresh  threads  of  con- 
nection, —  gradually,  as  the  old  stocking  gave  way 
to  the  savings-bank,  and  the  worship  of  the  solar 
guinea  became  extinct;  while  squires  and  baronets, 
and  even  lords  who  had  once  lived  blamelessly  afar 
from  the  civic  mind,  gathered  the  f aultiness  of  closer 
acquaintanceship.  Settlers,  too,  came  from  distant 
counties,  some  with  an  alarming  novelty  of  skill, 
others  with  an  offensive  advantage  in  cunning. 
In  fact,  much  the  same  sort  of  movement  and  mix- 
ture went  on  in  old  England  as  we  find  in  older 
Herodotus,  who  also,  in  telling  what  had  been, 
thought  it  well  to  take  a  woman's  lot  for  his  start- 
ing-point; though  lo,  as  a  maiden  apparently  be- 
guiled by  attractive  merchandise,  was  the  reverse 
of  Miss  Brooke,  and  in  this  respect  perhaps  bore 
more  resemblance  to  Eosamond  Vincy,  who  had 
excellent  taste  in  costume,  with  that  nymph-like 


MISS  BROOKE.  129 

figure  and  pure  blondness  which  give  the  largest 
range  to  choice  in  the  flow  and  colour  of  drapery. 
But  these  things  made  only  part  of  her  charm. 
She  was  admitted  to  be  the  flower  of  Mrs.  Lemon's 
school,  the  chief  school  in  the  county,  where  the 
teaching  included  all  that  was  demanded  in  the 
accomplished  female  —  even  to  extras,  such  as 
the  getting  in  and  out  of  a  carriage.  Mrs.  Lemon 
herself  had  always  held  up  Miss  Vincy  as  an  exam- 
ple :  no  pupil,  she  said,  exceeded  that  young  lady 
for  mental  acquisition  and  propriety  of  speech, 
while  her  musical  execution  was  quite  exceptional. 
We  cannot  help  the  way  in  which  people  speak  of 
us,  and  probably  if  Mrs.  Lemon  had  undertaken  to 
describe  Juliet  or  Imogen,  these  heroines  would  not 
have  seemed  poetical.  The  first  vision  of  Eosamond 
would  have  been  enough  with  most  judges  to  dis- 
pel any  prejudice  excited  by  Mrs.  Lemon's  praise. 

Lydgate  could  not  be  long  in  Middlemarch  with- 
out having  that  agreeable  vision,  or  even  without 
making  the  acquaintance  of  the  Vincy  family ;  for 
though  Mr.  Peacock,  whose  practice  he  had  paid 
something  to  enter  on,  had  not  been  their  doctor 
(Mrs.  Vincy  not  liking  the  lowering  system  adopted 
by  him),  he  had  many  patients  among  their  con- 
nections and  acquaintances.  For  who  of  any  con- 
sequence in  Middlemarch  was  not  connected  or  at 
least  acquainted  with  the  Vincys  ?  They  were  old 
manufacturers,  and  had  kept  a  good  house  for  three 
generations,  in  which  there  had  naturally  been 
much  intermarrying  with  neighbours  more  or  less 
decidedly  genteel.  Mr.  Vincy 's  sister  had  made  a 
wealthy  match  in  accepting  Mr.  Bulstrode,  who, 
however,  as  a  man  not  born  in  the  town,  and  alto- 
gether of  dimly  known  origin,  was  considered  to 
VOL.  i.  —  9 


130  MIDDLEMARCH. 

have  done  well  in  uniting  himself  with  a  real 
Middlemarch  family ;  on  the  other  hand,  Mr. 
Vincy  had  descended  a  little,  having  taken  an 
innkeeper's  daughter.  But  on  this  side  too  there 
was  a  cheering  sense  of  money ;  for  Mrs.  Vincy's 
sister  had  been  second  wife  to  rich  old  Mr.  Feath- 
erstone,  and  had  died  childless  years  ago,  so  that 
her  nephews  and  nieces  might  be  supposed  to  touch 
the  affections  of  the  widower.  And  it  happened 
that  Mr.  Bulstrode  and  Mr.  Featherstone,  two  of 
Peacock's  most  important  patients,  had,  from  dif- 
ferent causes,  given  an  especially  good  reception  to 
his  successor,  who  had  raised  some  partisanship  as 
well  as  discussion.  Mr.  Wrench,  medical  attend- 
ant to  the  Vincy  family,  very  early  had  grounds 
for  thinking  lightly  of  Lydgate's  professional  dis- 
cretion, and  there  was  no  report  about  him  which 
was  not  retailed  at  the  Vincys',  where  visitors 
were  frequent.  Mr.  Vincy  was  more  inclined  to 
general  good-fellowship  than  to  taking  sides,  but 
there  was  no  need  for  him  to  be  hasty  in  making 
any  new  man's  acquaintance.  Eosamond  silently 
wished  that  her  father  would  invite  Mr.  Lydgnte. 
<  She  was  tired  of  the  faces  and  figures  she  had 
always  been  used  to, — the  various  irregular  pro- 
files and  gaits  and  turns  of  phrase  distinguishing 
those  Middlemarch  young  men  whom  she  had 
known  as  boys.  She  had  been  at  school  with  girls 
of  higher  position,  whose  brothers,  she  felt  sure, 
it  would  have  been  possible  for  her  to  be  more 
interested  in  than  in  these  inevitable  Middle- 
march  companions.  But  she  would  not  have 
chosen  to  mention  her  wish  to  her  father ;  and  he, 
for  his  part,  was  in  no  hurry  on  the  subject.  An 
alderman  about  to  be  mayor  must  by  and  by 


MISS  BROOKE.  131 

enlarge  his    dinner-parties,   but   at   present   there 
were  plenty  of  guests  at  his  well-spread  table. 

That  table  often  remained  covered  with  the  relics 
of  the  family  breakfast  long  after  Mr.  Vincy  had 
gone  with  his  second  son  to  the  warehouse,  and 
when  Miss  Morgan  was  already  far  on  in  morning 
lessons  with  the  younger  girls  in  the  schoolroom. 
It  awaited  the  family  laggard,  who  found  any  sort 
of  inconvenience  (to  others)  less  disagreeable  than 
getting  up  when  he  was  called.  This  was  the  case 
one  morning  of  the  October  in  which  we  have 
lately  seen  Mr.  Casaubon  visiting  the  Grange ;  and 
though  the  room  was  a  little  overheated  with  the 
fire,  which  had  sent  the  spaniel  panting  to  a  remote 
corner,  Rosamond,  for  some  reason,  continued  to 
sit  at  her  embroidery  longer  than  usual,  now  and 
then  giving  herself  a  little  shake,  and  laying  her 
work  on  her  knee  to  contemplate  it  with  an  air  of 
hesitating  weariness.  Her  mamma,  who  had  re- 
turned from  an  excursion  to  the  kitchen,  sat  on 
the  other  side  of  the  small  work-table  with  an  air 
of  more  entire  placidity,  until  the  clock  again  giv- 
ing notice  that  it  was  going  to  strike,  she  looked 
up  from  the  lace-mending  which  was  occupying 
her  plump  fingers  and  rang  the  bell. 

"  Knock  at  Mr.  Fred's  door  again,  Pritchard, 
and  tell  him  it  has  struck  half-past  ten. " 

This  was  said  without  any  change  in  the  radiant 
good-humour  of  Mrs.  Vincy's  face,  in  which  forty- 
five  years  had  delved  neither  angles  nor  parallels ; 
and  pushing  back  her  pink  cap-strings,  she  let  her 
work  rest  on  her  lap,  while  she  looked  admiringly 
at  her  daughter. 

"  Mamma, "  said  Eosamond,  "  when  Fred  comes 
down  I  wish  you  would  not  let  him  have  red  her- 


132  MIDDLEMARCH. 

rings.  I  cannot  bear  the  smell  of  them  all  over 
the  house  at  this  hour  of  the  morning. " 

"  Oh,  my  dear,  you  are  so  hard  on  your  brothers ! 
It  is  the  only  fault  I  have  to  find  with  you.  You 
are  the  sweetest  temper  in  the  world,  but  you  are 
so  tetchy  with  your  brothers.  " 

"  Not  tetchy,  mamma :  you  never  hear  me  speak 
in  an  unladylike  way. " 

"  Well,  but  you  want  to  deny  them  things.  " 

"  Brothers  are  so  unpleasant.  " 

"  Oh,  my  dear,  you  must  allow  for  young  men. 
Be  thankful  if  they  have  good  hearts.  A  woman 
must  learn  to  put  up  with  little  things.  You  will 
be  married  some  day.  " 

"  Not  to  any  one  who  is  like  Fred. " 

"  Don't  decry  your  own  brother,  my  dear.  Few 
young  men  have  less  against  them,  although  he 
couldn't  take  his  degree, — I'm  sure  I  can't  un- 
derstand why,  for  he  seems  to  me  most  clever. 
And  you  know  yourself  he  was  thought  equal  to 
the  best  society  at  college.  So  particular  as  you 
are,  my  dear,  I  wonder  you  are  not  glad  to  have 
such  a  gentlemanly  young  man  for  a  brother. 
You  are  always  finding  fault  with  Bob  because  he 
is  not  Fred. " 

"  Oh,  no,  mamma,  only  because  he  is  Bob.  " 

"  Well,  my  dear,  you  will  not  find  any  Middle- 
march  young  man  who  has  not  something  against 
him." 

"  But  "  —  here  Eosamond  's  face  broke  into  a 
smile  which  suddenly  revealed  two  dimples.  She 
herself  thought  unfavourably  of  these  dimples,  and 
smiled  little  in  general  society.  "  But  I  shall  not 
marry  any  Middlemarch  young  man. " 

"  So  it  seems,  my  love,  for  you  have  as  good  as 


MISS  BROOKE.  133 

refused  the  pick  of  them ;  and  if  there  's  better  to 
be  had,  I'm  sure  there's  no  girl  better  deserves  it. " 

"  Excuse  me,  mamma,  —  I  wish  you  would  not 
say  '  the  pick  of  them. ' 

"  Why,  what  else  are  they  ?  " 

"  I  mean,  mamma,  it  is  rather  a  vulgar 
expression. " 

"  Very  likely,  my  dear ;  I  never  was  a  good 
speaker.  What  should  I  say  ?  " 

"  The  best  of  them.  " 

"  Why,  that  seems  just  as  plain  and  common. 
If  I  had  had  time  to  think,  I  should  have  said, 
'  the  most  superior  young  men. '  But  with  your 
education  you  must  know. " 

"  What  must  Eosy  know,  mother  ?  "  said  Mr. 
Fred,  who  had  slid  in  unobserved  through  the 
half-open  door  while  the  ladies  were  bending  over 
their  work,  and  now  going  up  to  the  fire  stood 
with  his  back  towards  it,  warming  the  soles  of  his 
slippers. 

"  Whether  it 's  right  to  say  '  superior  young 
men,'"  said  Mrs.  Vincy,  ringing  the  bell. 

"  Oh,  there  are  so  many  superior  teas  and  sugars 
now.  Superior  is  getting  to  be  shopkeepers' 
slang. " 

"  Are  you  beginning  to  dislike  slang,  then  ? " 
said  Eosamond,  with  mild  gravity. 

"  Only  the  wrong  sort  All  choice  of  words  is 
slang.  It  marks  a  class.  " 

"  There  is  correct  English  :  that  is  not  slang.  " 

"  I  beg  your  pardon  :  correct  English  is  the  slang 
of  prigs  who  write  history  and  essays.  And  the 
strongest  slang  of  all  is  the  slang  of  poets.  " 

"  You  will  say  anything,  Fred,  to  gain  your 
point. " 


134      .  MIDDLEM  ARGIL 

"  Well,  tell  me  whether  it  is  slang  or  poetry  to 
call  an  ox  a  leg-plaiter. " 

"  Of  course  you  can  call  it  poetry  if  you  like.  " 

"Aha,  Miss  Rosy,  you  don't  know  Homer  from 
slang.  I  shall  invent  a  new  game ;  I  shall  write 
bits  of  slang  and  poetry  on  slips,  and  give  them 
to  you  to  separate. " 

"  Dear  me,  how  amusing  it  is  to  hear  young 
people  talk !  "  said  Mrs.  Vincy,  with  cheerful 
admiration. 

"  Have  you  got  nothing  else  for  my  breakfast, 
Pritchard  ? "  said  Fred,  to  the  servant  who  brought 
in  coffee  and  buttered  toast;  while  he  walked 
round  the  table  surveying  the  ham,  potted  beef, 
and  other  cold  remnants,  with  an  air  of  silent 
rejection,  and  polite  forbearance  from  signs  of 
disgust. 

"  Should  you  like  eggs,  sir  ?  " 

"  Eggs,  no !     Bring  me  a  grilled  bone.  " 

"  Really,  Fred, "  said  Rosamond,  when  the  ser- 
vant had  left  the  room,  "  if  you  must  have  hot 
things  for  breakfast,  I  wish  you  would  come  down 
earlier.  You  can  get  up  at  six  o'clock  to  go  out 
hunting ;  I  cannot  understand  why  you  find  it  so 
difficult  to  get  up  on  other  mornings. " 

"  That  is  your  want  of  understanding,  Rosy.  I 
can  get  up  to  go  hunting  because  I  like  it. " 

"  What  would  you  think  of  me  if  I  came  down 
two  hours  after  every  one  else  and  ordered  grilled 
bone  ? " 

"  I  should  think  you  were  an  uncommonly  fast 
young  lady, "  said  Fred,  eating  his  toast  with  the 
utmost  composure. 

"  I  cannot  see  why  brothers  are  to  make  them- 
selves  disagreeable,  any  more  than  sisters." 


MISS  BROOKE.  135 

"I  don't  make  myself  disagreeable;  it  is  you 
who  find  me  so.  Disagreeable  is  a  word  that  de- 
scribes your  feelings  and  not  my  actions.  " 

"  I  think  it  describes  the  smell  of  grilled  bone. " 

"  Not  at  all.  It  describes  a  sensation  in  your 
little  nose  associated  with  certain  finicking  notions 
which  are  the  classics  of  Mrs.  Lemon's  school. 
Look  at  my  mother:  you  don't  see  her  objecting 
to  everything  except  what  she  does  herself.  She 
is  my  notion  of  a  pleasant  woman. " 

"  Bless  you  both,  my  dears,  and  don't  quarrel," 
said  Mrs.  Vincy,  with  motherly  cordiality.  "  Come, 
Fred,  tell  us  all  about  the  new  doctor.  How  is 
your  uncle  pleased  with  him  ?  " 

"  Pretty  well,  I  think.  He  asks  Lydgate  all 
sorts  of  questions,  and  then  screws  up  his  face 
while  he  hears  the  answers,  as  if  they  were  pinch- 
ing his  toes.  That 's  his  way.  Ah,  here  comes 
my  grilled  bone. " 

"  But  how  came  you  to  stay  out  so  late,  my 
dear?  You  only  said  you  were  going  to  your 
uncle's. " 

"  Oh,  I  dined  at  Plymdale's.  We  had  whist. 
Lydgate  was  there  too. " 

"  And  what  do  you  think  of  him  ?  He  is  very 
gentlemanly,  I  suppose.  They  say  he  is  of  excel- 
lent family,  —  his  relations  quite  county  people.  " 

"  Yes, "  said  Fred.  "  There  was  a  Lydgate  at 
John's  who  spent  no  end  of  money.  I  find  this 
man  is  a  second  cousin  of  his.  But  rich  men  may 
have  very  poor  devils  for  second  cousins. " 

"  It  always  makes  a  difference,  though,  to  be  of 
good  family, "  said  Rosamond,  with  a  tone  of  deci- 
sion which  showed  that  she  had  thought  on  this 
subject.  Rosamond  felt  that  she  might  have  been 


136  MIDDLEMARCH. 

happier  if  she  had  not  been  the  daughter  of  a 
Middlemarch  manufacturer.  She  disliked  any- 
thing which  reminded  her  that  her  mother's  father 
had  been  an  innkeeper.  Certainly  any  one  remem- 
bering the  fact  might  think  that  Mrs.  Vincy  had 
the  air  of  a  very  handsome  good-humoured  land- 
lady, accustomed  to  the  most  capricious  orders  of 
gentlemen. 

"  I  thought  it  was  odd  his  name  was  Tertius, " 
said  the  bright-faced  matron,  "  but  of  course  it 's 
a  name  in  the  family.  But  now,  tell  us  exactly 
what  sort  of  man  he  is. " 

"Oh,  tallish,  dark,  clever, —  talks  well, —  rather 
a  prig,  I  think.  " 

"  I  never  can  make  out  what  you  mean  by  a 
prig,"  said  Eosamond. 

"  A  fellow  who  wants  to  show  that  he  has 
opinions. " 

"  Why,  my  dear,  doctors  must  have  opinions, " 
said  Mrs.  Vincy.  "  What  are  they  there  for  else  ?  " 

"  Yes,  mother,  the  opinions  they  are  paid  for. 
But  a  prig  is  a  fellow  who  is  always  making  you  a 
present  of  his  opinions.  " 

"  I  suppose  Mary  Garth  admires  Mr.  Lydgate, " 
said  Rosamond,  not  without  a  touch  of  innuendo. 

"  Really,  I  can't  say,"  said  Fred,  rather  glumly, 
as  he  left  the  table,  and  taking  up  a  novel  which 
he  had  brought  down  with  him,  threw  himself 
into  an  arm-chair.  "  If  you  are  jealous  of  her,  go 
oftener  to  Stone  Court  yourself  and  eclipse  her.  " 

"  I  wish  you  would  not  be  so  vulgar,  Fred.  If 
you  have  finished,  pray  ring  the  bell. " 

"  It  is  true,  though,  —  what  your  brother  says, 
Rosamond,"  Mrs.  Vincy  began,  when  the  servant 
had  cleared  the  table.  "  It  is  a  thousand  pities 


MISS  BROOKE.  137 

you  haven't  patience  to  go  and  see  your  uncle 
more,  so  proud  of  you  as  he  is,  and  wanted  you 
to  live  with  him.  There  's  no  knowing  what  he 
might  have  done  for  you  as  well  as  for  Fred.  God 
knows,  I  'm  fond  of  having  you  at  home  with  me, 
but  I  can  part  with  my  children  for  their  good. 
And  now  it  stands  to  reason  that  your  uncle 
Featherstone  will  do  something  for  Mary  Garth.  " 

"  Mary  Garth  can  bear  being  at  Stone  Court,  be- 
cause she  likes  that  better  than  being  a  governess,  * 
said  Rosamond,  folding  up  her  work.  "  I  would 
rather  not  have  anything  left  to  me  if  I  must  earn 
it  by  enduring  much  of  my  uncle's  cough  and  his 
ugly  relations. " 

"He  can't  be  long  for  this  world,  my  dear;  I 
wouldn't  hasten  his  end,  but  what  with  asthma 
and  that  inward  complaint,  let  us  hope  there  is 
something  better  for  him  in  another.  And  I  have 
no  ill-will  towards  Mary  Garth,  but  there  's  jus- 
tice to  be  thought  of.  And  Mr.  Featherstone's 
first  wife  brought  him  no  money,  as  my  sister  did. 
Her  nieces  and  nephews  can't  have  so  much  claim 
as  my  sister's.  And  I  must  say  I  think  Mary 
Garth  a  dreadful  plain  girl,  —  more  fit  for  a 
governess. " 

"  Every  one  would  not  agree  with  you  there, 
mother, "  said  Fred,  who  seemed  to  be  able  to  read 
and  listen  too. 

"  Well,  my  dear, "  said  Mrs.  Vincy,  wheeling 
skilfully,  "  if  she  had  some  fortune  left  her, —  a 
man  marries  his  wife's  relations,  and  the  Garths 
are  so  poor,  and  live  in  such  a  small  way.  But  I 
shall  leave  you  to  your  studies,  my  dear;  for  I 
must  go  and  do  some  shopping. " 

"Fred's  studies  are  not  very  deep,"  said  Rosa- 


138  MIDDLEMARCH. 

mond,  rising  with  her  mamma,  "  he  is  only  read- 
ing a  novel. " 

"  Well,  well,  by  and  by  he  '11  go  to  his  Latin 
and  things,"  said  Mrs.  "Vincy,  soothingly,  stroking 
her  son's  head.  "  There  's  a  fire  in  the  smoking- 
room  on  purpose.  It 's  your  father's  wish,  you 
know,  —  Fred,  my  dear,  —  and  I  always  tell  him 
you  will  be  good,  and  go  to  college  again  to  take 
your  degree. " 

Fred  drew  his  mother's  hand  down  to  his  lips, 
but  said  nothing. 

"  I  suppose  you  are  not  going  out  riding  to-day  ?" 
said  Eosamond,  lingering  a  little  after  her  mamma 
was  gone. 

"  No ;  why  ?  " 

"  Papa  says  I  may  have  the  chestnut  to  ride 
now. " 

"  You  can  go  with  me  to-morrow,  if  you  like. 
Only  I  am  going  to  Stone  Court,  remember. " 

"  I  want  to  ride  so  much,  it  is  indifferent  to  me 
where  we  go. "  Eosamond  really  wished  to  go  to 
Stone  Court,  of  all  other  places. 

"  Oh,  I  say,  Eosy, "  said  Fred,  as  she  was  passing 
out  of  the  room,  "  if  you  are  going  to  the  piano, 
let  me  come  and  play  some  airs  with  you. " 

"  Pray,  do  not  ask  me  this  morning.  " 

"  Why  not  this  morning  ?  " 

"  Eeally,  Fred,  I  wish  you  would  leave  off  play- 
ing the  flute.  A  man  looks  very  silly  playing  the 
flute.  And  you  play  so  out  of  tune. " 

"  When  next  any  one  makes  love  to  you,  Miss 
Eosamond,  I  will  tell  him  how  obliging  you  are. " 

"  Why  should  you  expect  me  to  oblige  you  by 
hearing  you  play  the  flute,  any  more  than  T  should 
expect  you  to  oblige  me  by  not  playing  it  ?  " 


MISS  BROOKE.  139 

"  And  why  should  you  expect  me  to  take  you 
out  riding  ?  " 

This  question  led  to  an  adjustment,  for  Rosa- 
mond had  set  her  mind  on  that  particular  ride. 

So  Fred  was  gratified  with  nearly  an  hour's 
practice  of  "  Ar  hyd  y  nos, "  "  Ye  banks  and  braes, " 
and  other  favourite  airs  from  his  "  Instructor  on  the 
Flute  ;  "  a  wheezy  performance,  into  which  he  threw 
much  ambition  and  an  irrepressible  hopefulness. 


CHAPTEK  XIL 

He  had  more  tow  on  his  distaffe 
Thau  Gerveis  knew. 

CHAUCEB. 

THE  ride  to  Stone  Court,  which  Fred  arid  Eosa- 
inoud  took  the  next  morning,  lay  through  a  pretty 
bit  of  midland  landscape,  almost  all  meadows  and 
pastures,  with  hedgerows  still  allowed  to  grow  in 
bushy  beauty  and  to  spread  out  coral  fruit  for  the 
birds.  Little  details  gave  each  field  a  particular 
physiognomy,  dear  to  the  eyes  that  have  looked  on 
them  from  childhood  :  the  pool  in  the  corner  where 
the  grasses  were  dank  and  trees  leaned  whisper- 
ingly;  the  great  oak  shadowing  a  bare  place  in 
mid-pasture ;  the  high  bank  where  the  ash-trees 
grew ;  the  sudden  slope  of  the  old  marl-pit  making 
a  red  background  for  the  burdock;  the  huddled 
roofs  and  ricks  of  the  homestead  without  a  trace- 
able way  of  approach;  the  gray  gate  and  fences 
against  the  depths  of  the  bordering  wood ;  and  the 
stray  hovel,  its  old,  old  thatch  full  of  mossy  hills 
and  valleys  with  wondrous  modulations  of  light 
and  shadow  such  as  we  travel  far  to  see  in  later 
life,  and  see  larger,  but  not  more  beautiful.  These 
are  the  things  that  make  the  gamut  of  joy  in  land- 
scape to  midland -bred  souls,  —  the  things  they 
toddled  among,  or  perhaps  learned  by  heart  stand- 
ing between  their  father's  knees  while  he  drove 
leisurely. 


MISS  BROOKE.  141 

But  the  road,  even  the  by-road,  was  excellent; 
for  Lowick,  as  we  have  seen,  was  not  a  parish  of 
inuddy  lanes  and  poor  tenants ;  and  it  was  into 
Lowick  parish  that  Fred  and  Eosaraond  entered 
after  a  couple  of  miles'  riding.  Another  mile 
would  bring  them  to  Stone  Court,  and  at  the  end  of 
the  first  half  the  house  was  already  visible,  look- 
ing as  if  it  had  been  arrested  in  its  growth  toward 
a  stone  mansion  by  an  unexpected  budding  of  farm- 
buildings  on  its  left  flank,  which  had  hindered  it 
from  becoming  anything  more  than  the  substantial 
dwelling  of  a  gentleman  farmer.  It  was  not  the 
less  agreeable  an  object  in  the  distance  for  the 
cluster  of  pinnacled  corn-ricks  which  balanced 
the  fine  row  of  walnuts  on  the  right. 

Presently  it  was  possible  to  discern  something 
that  might  be  a  gig  on  the  circular  drive  before 
the  front  door. 

"  Dear  me, "  said  Eosamond,  "  I  hope  none  of 
my  uncle's  horrible  relations  are  there." 

"  They  are,  though.  That  is  Mrs.  Waule's  gig, 
—  the  last  yellow  gig  left,  I  should  think.  When 
I  see  Mrs.  Waule  in  it,  I  understand  how  yellow 
can  have  been  worn  for  mourning.  That  gig  seems 
to  me  more  funereal  than  a  hearse.  But  then  Mrs. 
Waule  always  has  black  crape  on.  How  does  she 
manage  it,  Eosy  ?  Her  friends  can't  always  be 
dying. " 

"  I  don't  know  at  all.  And  she  is  not  in  the 
least  evangelical, "  said  Eosamond,  reflectively,  as 
if  that  religious  point  of  view  would  have  fully 
accounted  for  perpetual  crape.  "  And  not  poor, " 
she  added,  after  a  moment's  pause. 

"  No,  by  George !  They  are  as  rich  as  Jews, 
those  Waules  and  Featherstones ;  I  mean,  for  peo- 


H2  MIDDLEMARCH. 

pie  like  them,  who  don't  want  to  spend  anything. 
And  yet  they  hang  about  my  uncle  like  vultures, 
and  are  afraid  of  a  farthing  going  away  from  their 
side  of  the  family.  But  I  believe  he  hates  them 
all." 

The  Mrs.  Waule  who  was  so  far  from  being 
admirable  in  the  eyes  of  these  distant  connections, 
had  happened  to  say  this  very  morning  (not  at  all 
with  a  defiant  air,  but  in  a  low,  muffled,  neutral 
tone,  as  of  a  voice  heard  through  cotton  wool)  that 
she  did  not  wish  "  to  enjoy  their  good  opinion. " 
She  was  seated,  as  she  observed,  on  her  own 
brother's  hearth,  and  had  been  Jane  Featherstone 
five-and-twenty  years  before  she  had  been  Jane 
Waule,  which  entitled  her  to  speak  when  her  own 
brother's  name  had  been  made  free  with  by  those 
who  had  no  right  to  it. 

"  What  are  you  driving  at  there  ?  "  said  Mr. 
Featherstone,  holding  his  stick  between  his  knees 
and  settling  his  wig,  while  he  gave  her  a  mo- 
mentary sharp  glance,  which  seemed  to  react 
on  him  like  a  draught  of  cold  air  and  set  him 
coughing. 

Mrs.  Waule  had  to  defer  her  answer  till  he  was 
quiet  again,  till  Mary  Garth  had  supplied  him 
with  fresh  syrup,  and  he  had  begun  to  rub  the 
gold  knob  of  his  stick,  looking  bitterly  at  the  fire. 
It  was  a  bright  fire,  but  it  made  no  difference  to 
the  chill-looking  purplish  tint  of  Mrs.  Waule's 
face,  which  was  as  neutral  as  her  voice ;  having 
mere  chinks  for  eyes,  and  lips  that  hardly  moved 
in  speaking. 

"  The  doctors  can't  master  that  cough,  brother. 
It's  just  like  what  I  have;  for  I'm  your  own 
sister,  constitution  and  everything.  But,  as  I  was 


MISS  BROOKE.  143 

saying,  it 's  a  pity  Mrs.  Vincy's  family  can't  be 
better  conducted.  " 

"  Tchah  !  you  said  nothing  o'  the  sort.  You  said 
somebody  had  made  free  with  my  name. " 

"  And  no  more  than  can  be  proved,  if  what 
everybody  says  is  true.  My  brother  Solomon  tells 
me  it 's  the  talk  up  and  down  in  Middlemarch  how 
unsteady  young  Vincy  is,  and  has  been  forever 
gambling  at  billiards  since  home  he  came. " 

"  Nonsense  !  What 's  a  game  at  billiards  ?  It 's 
a  good  gentlemanly  game ;  and  young  Vincy  is  not 
a  clodhopper.  If  your  son  John  took  to  billiards, 
now,  he  'd  make  a  fool  of  himself. " 

"  Your  nephew  John  never  took  to  billiards  or 
any  other  game,  brother,  and  is  far  from  losing 
hundreds  of  pounds,  which,  if  what  everybody 
says  is  true,  must  be  found  somewhere  else  than 
out  of  Mr.  Vincy  the  father's  pocket.  For  they 
say  he  's  been  losing  money  for  years,  though  no- 
body would  think  so,  to  see  him  go  coursing  and 
keeping  open  house  as  they  do.  And  I  've  heard 
say  Mr.  Bulstrode  condemns  Mrs.  Vincy  beyond 
anything  for  her  flightiness,  and  spoiling  her 
children  so. " 

"  What 's  Bulstrode  to  me  ?  I  don't  bank  with 
him." 

"  Well,  Mrs.  Bulstrode  is  Mr.  Vincy's  own  sis- 
ter, and  they  do  say  that  Mr.  Vincy  mostly  trades 
on  the  Bank  money,  and  you  may  see  yourself, 
brother,  when  a  woman  past  forty  has  pink  strings 
always  flying,  and  that  light  way  of  laughing  at 
everything,  it 's  very  unbecoming.  But  indulging 
your  children  is  one  thing,  and  finding  money  to 
pay  their  debts  is  another.  And  it 's  openly  said 
that  young  Vincy  has  raised  money  on  his  expec- 


M4  MIDDLEMARCH. 

tations.  I  don't  say  what  expectations.  Miss 
Garth  hears  me,  and  is  welcome  to  tell  again.  I 
know  young  people  hang  together. " 

"  No,  thank  you,  Mrs.  Waule, "  said  Mary  Garth. 
*  I  dislike  hearing  scandal  too  much  to  wish  to 
repeat  it. " 

Mr.  Featherstone  rubbed  the  knob  of  his  stick 
and  made  a  brief  convulsive  show  of  laughter, 
which  had  much  the  same  genuineness  as  an  old 
whist-player's  chuckle  over  a  bad  hand.  Still 
looking  at  the  fire,  he  said,  — 

"  And  who  pretends  to  say  Fred  Vincy  hasn't 
got  expectations  ?  Such  a  fine,  -spirited  fellow  is 
like  enough  to  have  'em. " 

There  was  a  slight  pause  before  Mrs.  Waule 
replied,  and  when  she  did  so,  her  voice  seemed  to 
be  slightly  moistened  with  tears,  though  her  face 
was  still  dry. 

"  Whether  or  no,  brother,  it  is  naturally  painful 
to  me  and  my  brother  Solomon  to  hear  your  name 
made  free  with,  and  your  complaint  being  such  as 
may  carry  you  off  sudden,  and  people  who  are  no 
more  Featherstones  than  the  Merry-Andrew  at  the 
fair,  openly  reckoning  on  your  property  coming  to 
them.  And  me  your  own  sister,  and  Solomon  your 
own  brother !  And  if  that 's  to  be  it,  what  has  it 
pleased  the  Almighty  to  make  families  for?  ".Here 
Mrs.  Waule's  tears  fell,  but  with  moderation. 

"Come,  out  with  it,  Jane!"  said  Mr.  Feather- 
stone,  looking  at  her.  "  You  mean  to  say, 
Fred  Vincy  has  been  getting  somebody  to  advance 
him  money  on  what  he  says  he  knows  about  my 
will,  eh  ?  " 

"  I  never  said  so,  brother.  "  (Mrs.  Waule's  voice 
had  again  become  dry  and  unshaken. )  "  It  was 


MISS  BROOKE.  145 

told  me  by  my  brother  Solomon  last  night  when 
he  called  coming  from  market  to  give  me  advice 
about  the  old  wheat,  me  being  a  widow,  and  my 
son  John  only  three-and-twenty,  though  steady 
beyond  anything.  And  he  had  it  from  most  un- 
deniable authority,  and  not  one,  but  many. " 

"  Stuff  and  nonsense!  I  don't  believe  a  word  of 
it.  It 's  all  a  got-up  story.  Go  to  the  window, 
missy ;  I  thought  I  heard  a  horse.  See  if  the 
doctor  's  coming. " 

"  Not  got  up  by  me,  brother,  nor  yet  by  Solo- 
mon, who,  whatever  else  he  may  be,  — and  I  don't 
deny  he  has  oddities,  —  has  made  his  will  and 
parted  his  property  equal  between  such  kin  as  he  's 
friends  with ;  though,  for  my  part,  I  think  there 
are  times  when  some  should  be  considered  more 
than  others.  But  Solomon  makes  it  no  secret 
what  he  means  to  do. " 

"  The  more  fool  he !  "  said  Mr.  Featherstone,  with 
some  difficulty  ;  breaking  into  a  severe  fit  of  cough- 
ing that  required  Mary  Garth  to  stand  near  him, 
so  that  she  did  not  find  out  whose  horses  they  were 
which  presently  paused  stamping  on  the  gravel 
before  the  door. 

Before  Mr.  Featherstone's  cough  was  quiet, 
Eosamond  entered,  bearing  up  her  riding-habit 
with  much  grace.  She  bowed  ceremoniously  to 
Mrs.  Waule,  who  said  stiffly,  "  How  do  you  do, 
miss  ?  "  smiled  and  nodded  silently  to  Mary,  and 
remained  standing  till  the  coughing  should  cease, 
and  allow  her  uncle  to  notice  her. 

"  Heyday,  miss ! "  he  said  at  last,  "  you  have  a 
fine  colour.  Where  's  Fred  ?  " 

"  Seeing  about  the  horses.  He  will  be  in 
presently. " 

VOL.  I.  —  10 


1 46  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"Sit  down,  sit  down.    Mrs.  Waule,  you  'd  better 

go." 

Even  those  neighbours  who  had  called  Peter 
Featherstone  an  old  fox,  had  never  accused  him  of 
being  insincerely  polite,  and  his  sister  was  quite 
used  to  the  peculiar  absence  of  ceremony  with 
which  he  marked  his  sense  of  blood-relationship. 
Indeed,  she  herself  was  accustomed  to  think  that 
entire  freedom  from  the  necessity  of  behaving 
agreeably  was  included  in  the  Almighty's  inten- 
tions about  families.  She  rose  slowly  without  any 
sign  of  resentment,  and  said  in  her  usual  muffled 
monotone,  "  Brother,  I  hope  the  new  doctor  will 
be  able  to  do  something  for  you.  Solomon  says 
there  's  great  talk  of  his  cleverness.  I  'm  sure 
it 's  my  .wish  you  should  be  spared.  And  there  's 
none  more  ready  to  nurse  you  than  your  own  sister 
and  your  own  nieces,  if  you  'd  only  say  the  word. 
There  's  Rebecca,  and  Joanna,  and  Elizabeth,  you 
know. " 

"  Ay,  ay,  I  remember,  —  you  '11  see  I  've  remem- 
bered 'em  all,  —  all  dark  and  ugly.  They  'd  need 
have  some  money,  eh  ?  There  never  was  any 
beauty  in  the  women  of  our  family ;  but  the 
Featherstones  have  always  had  some  money,  and 
the  Waules  too.  Waule  had  money  too.  A  warm 
man  was  Waule.  Ay,  ay ;  money  's  a  good  egg ; 
and  if  you  've  got  money  to  leave  behind  you,  lay 
it  in  a  warm  nest.  Good-by,  Mrs.  Waule. " 

Here  Mr.  Featherstoue  pulled  at  both  sides  of 
his  wig  as  if  he  wanted  to  deafen  himself,  and  his 
sister  went  away  ruminating  on  this  oracular 
speech  of  his.  Notwithstanding  her  jealousy  of 
the  Vincys  and  of  Mary  Garth,  there  remained  as 
the  nethermost  sediment  in  her  mental  shallows 


MISS  BROOKE.  147 

a  persuasion  that  her  brother  Peter  Featherstone 
could  never  leave  his  chief  property  away  from 
his  blood  relations :  else,  why  had  the  Almighty 
carried  off  his  two  wives  both  childless,  after  he 
had  gained  so  much  by  manganese  and  things, 
turning  up  when  nobody  expected  it  ?  —  and  why 
was  there  a  Lowick  parish  church,  and  the  Waules 
and  Powderells  all  sitting  in  the  same  pew  for 
generations,  and  the  Featherstone  pew  next  to 
them,  if,  the  Sunday  after  her  brother  Peter's 
death,  everybody  was  to  know  that  the  property 
was  gone  out  of  the  family  ?  The  human  mind 
has  at  no  period  accepted  a  moral  chaos ;  and  so 
preposterous  a  result  was  not  strictly  conceivable. 
But  we  are  frightened  at  much  that  is  not  strictly 
conceivable. 

When  Fred  came  in  the  old  man  eyed  him  with 
a  peculiar  twinkle,  which  the  younger  had  often 
had  reason  to  interpret  as  pride  in  the  satisfactory 
details  of  his  appearance. 

"  You  two  misses  go  away, "  said  Mr.  Feather- 
stone.  "  I  want  to  speak  to  Fred. " 

"  Come  into  my  room,  Eosamond,  you  will  not 
mind  the  cold  for  a  little  while,"  said  Mary. 
The  two  girls  had  not  only  known  each  other  in 
childhood,  but  had  been  at  the  same  provincial 
school  together  (Mary  as  an  articled  pupil),  so  that 
they  had  many  memories  in  common,  and  liked 
very  well  to  talk  in  private.  Indeed,  this  tSte-d- 
ttte,  was  one  of  Eosamond 's  objects  in  coming  to 
Stone  Court. 

Old  Featherstone  would  not  begin  the  dialogue 
till  the  door  had  been  closed.  He  continued  to 
look  at  Fred  with  the  same  twinkle  and  with  one 
of  his  habitual  grimaces,  alternately  screwing  and 


148  MIDDLEMARCH. 

widening  his  mouth ;  and  when  he  spoke,  it  was 
in  a  low  tone,  which  might  be  taken  for  that  of 
an  informer  ready  to  be  bought  off,  rather  than  for 
the  tone  of  an  offended  senior.  He  was  not  a 
man  to  feel  any  strong  moral  indignation  even  on 
account  of  trespasses  against  himself.  It  was  natu- 
ral that  others  should  want  to  get  an  advantage 
over  him ;  but  then,  he  was  a  little  too  cunning  for 
them. 

"  So,  sir,  you  've  been  paying  ten  per  cent  for 
money  which  you  've  promised  to  pay  off  by  mort- 
gaging my  land  when  I  'm  dead  and  gone,  eh  ? 
You  put  my  life  at  a  twelvemonth,  say.  But  I 
can  alter  my  will  yet. " 

Fred  blushed.  He  had  not  borrowed  money  in 
that  way,  for  excellent  reasons.  But  he  was  con- 
scious of  having  spoken  with  some  confidence  (per- 
haps with  more  than  he  exactly  remembered)  about 
his  prospect  of  getting  Featherstone's  land  as  a 
future  means  of  paying  present  debts. 

"  I  don't  know  what  you  refer  to,  sir.  I  have 
certainly  never  borrowed  any  money  on  such  an 
insecurity.  Please  to  explain.  " 

"  No,  sir,  it 's  you  must  explain.  I  can  alter 
my  will  yet,  let  me  tell  you.  I  'm  of  sound  mind, 
—  can  reckon  compound  interest  in  my  head,  and 
remember  every  fool's  name  as  well  as  I  could 
twenty  years  ago.  What  the  deuce  ?  I  'm  under 
eighty.  I  say,  you  must  contradict  this  story. " 

"  I  have  contradicted  it,  sir, "  Fred  answered, 
with  a  touch  of  impatience,  not  remembering  that 
his  uncle  did  not  verbally  discriminate  contradict- 
ing from  disproving,  though  no  one  was  further 
from  confounding  the  two  ideas  than  old  Feather- 
stone,  who  often  wondered  that  so  many  fools  took 


MISS  BROOKE.  149 

his  own  assertions  for  proofs.  "  But  I  contradict 
it  again.  The  story  is  a  silly  lie. " 

"  Nonsense !  you  must  bring  dockiments.  It 
comes  from  authority. " 

"  Name  the  authority,  and  make  him  name  the 
man  of  whom  I  borrowed  the  money,  and  then  I 
can  disprove  the  story. " 

"  It  's  pretty  good  authority,  I  think,  —  a  man 
who  knows  most  of  what  goes  on  in  Middlemarch. 
It 's  that  fine,  religious,  charitable  uncle  o'  yours. 
Come  now ! "  Here  Mr.  Featherstone  had  his 
peculiar  inward  shake  which  signified  merriment. 

"  Mr.  Bulstrode  ?  " 

"  Who  else,  eh  ?  " 

"  Then  the  story  has  grown  into  this  lie  out  of 
some  sermonizing  words  he  may  have  let  fall  about 
me.  Do  they  pretend  that  he  named  the  man  who 
lent  me  the  money  ?  " 

"  If  there  is  such  a  man.  depend  upon  it  Bui- 
strode  knows  him.  But,  supposing  you  only  tried 
to  get  the  money  lent,  and  didn't  get  it,  Bulstrode 
'ud  know  that  too.  You  bring  me  a  writing  from 
Bulstrode  to  say  he  doesn't  believe  you've  ever 
promised  to  pay  your  debts  out  o'  my  land.  Come 
now!" 

Mr.  Featherstone 's  face  required  its  whole  scale 
of  grimaces  as  a  muscular  outlet  to  his  silent  tri- 
umph in  the  soundness  of  his  faculties. 

Fred  felt  himself  to  be  in  a  disgusting  dilemma. 

"  You  must  be  joking,  sir.  Mr.  Bulstrode,  like 
other  men,  believes  scores  of  things  that  are  not 
true,  and  he  has  a  prejudice  against  me.  I  could 
easily  get  him  to  write  that  he  knew  no  facts  in 
proof  of  the  report  you  speak  of,  though  it  might 
lead  to  unpleasantness.  But  I  could  hardly  ask 


1 50  MIDDLEMARCH. 

him  to  write  down  what  he  believes  or  does  not 
believe  about  rue. "  Fred  paused  an  instant,  and 
then  added,  in  politic  appeal  to  his  uncle's  vanity, 
"  That  is  hardly  a  thing  for  a  gentleman  to  ask. " 

But  he  was  disappointed  in  the  result. 

"  Ay,  I  know  what  you  mean.  You  'd  sooner 
offend  me  than  Bulstrode.  And  what 's  he  ?  — • 
he  's  got  no  land  hereabout  that  ever  I  heard  tell 
of.  A  speckilating  fellow!  He  may  come  down 
any  day,  when  the  devil  leaves  off  backing  him. 
And  that  's  what  his  religion  means :  he  wants 
God  A'rnighty  to  come  in.  That's  nonsense! 
There  's  one  thing  I  made  out  pretty  clear  when  I 
used  to  go  to  church,  and  it 's  this  :  God  A'mighty 
sticks  to  the  land.  He  promises  land,  and  He 
gives  land,  and  He  makes  chaps  rich  with  corn 
and  cattle.  But  you  take  the  other  side.  You 
like  Bulstrode  and  speckilation  better  than  Feath- 
erstone  and  land. " 

"I  beg  your  pardon,  sir,"  said  Fred,  rising, 
standing  with  his  back  to  the  fire  and  beating  his 
boot  with  his  whip.  "  I  like  neither  Bulstrode 
nor  speculation. "  He  spoke  rather  sulkily,  feeling 
himself  stalemated. 

"  Well,  well,  you  can  do  without  me,  that  's 
pretty  clear,"  said  old  Featherstone,  secretly  dis- 
liking the  possibility  that  Fred  would  show  him- 
self at  all  independent.  "  You  neither  want  a  bit 
of  land  to  make  a  squire  of  you  instead  of  a  starv- 
ing parson,  nor  a  lift  of  a  hundred  pound  by  the 
way.  It 's  all  one  to  me.  I  can  make  five  codicils 
if  I  like,  and  I  shall  keep  my  bank-notes  for  a 
nest-egg.  It 's  all  one  to  me. " 

Fred  coloured  again.  Featherstone  had  rarely 
given  him  presents  of  money,  and  at  this  moment 


MISS  BROOKE.  151 

it  seemed  almost  harder  to  part  with  the  immedi- 
ate prospect  of  bank-notes  than  with  the  more 
distant  prospect  of  the  land. 

"  I  am  not  ungrateful,  sir.  I  never  meant  to 
show  disregard  for  any  kind  intentions  you  might 
have  towards  me.  On  the  contrary.  " 

"  Very  good.  Then  prove  it.  You  bring  me  a 
letter  from  Bulstrode  saying  he  doesn't  believe 
you  've  been  cracking  and  promising  to  pay  your 
debts  out  o'  my  land,  and  then,  if  there  's  any 
scrape  you  've  got  into,  we  '11  see  if  I  can't  back 
you  a  bit.  Come  now !  That 's  a  bargain.  Here, 
give  me  your  arm.  I  '11  try  and  walk  round  the 
room.  " 

Fred,  in  spite  of  his  irritation,  had  kindness 
enough  in  him  to  be  a  little  sorry  for  the  unloved, 
unvenerated  old  man,  who  with  his  dropsical  legs 
looked  more  than  usually  pitiable  in  walking. 
While  giving  his  arm,  he  thought  that  he  should 
not  himself  like  to  be  an  old  fellow  with  his  con- 
stitution breaking  up ;  and  he  waited  good-tem- 
peredly,  first  before  the  window  to  hear  the  wonted 
remarks  about  the  guinea-fowls  and  the  weather- 
cock, and  then  before  the  scanty  book-shelves,  of 
which  the  chief  glories  in  dark  calf  were  Josephus, 
Culpepper,  Klopstock's  "Messiah,"  and  several 
volumes  of  the  "  Gentleman's  Magazine. " 

"  Read  me  the  names  o'  the  books.  Come  now ! 
You  're  a  college  man.  " 

Fred  gave  him  the  titles. 

"  "What  did  missy  want  with  more  books  ? 
What  must  you  be  bringing  her  more  books  for?  " 

"  They  amuse  her,  sir.  She  is  very  fond  of 
reading. " 

"  A  little  too  fond, "  said  Mr.  Featherstone,  cap- 


1 52  MIDDLEMARCH. 

tiously.  "  She  was  for  reading  when  she  sat  with 
me.  But  I  put  a  stop  to  that.  She  's  got  the 
newspaper  to  read  out  loud.  That 's  enough  for 
one  day,  I  should  think.  I  can't  abide  to  see  her 
reading  to  herself.  You  mind  and  not  bring  her 
any  more  books,  do  you  hear  ? " 

"  Yes,  sir,  I  hear. "  Fred  had  received  this 
order  before,  and  had  secretly  disobeyed  it.  He 
intended  to  disobey  it  again. 

"  Ring  the  bell, "  said  Mr.  Featherstone ;  "  I 
want  missy  to  come  down. " 

Rosamond  and  Mary  had  been  talking  faster  than 
their  male  friends.  They  did  not  think  of  sitting 
down,  but  stood  at  the  toilet-table  near  the  win- 
dow while  Rosamond  took  off  her  hat,  adjusted  her 
veil,  and  applied  little  touches  of  her  finger-tips  to 
her  hair,  —  hair  of  infantine  fairness,  neither  flaxen 
nor  yellow.  Mary  Garth  seemed  all  the  plainer 
standing  at  an  angle  between  the  two  nymphs,  — 
the  one  in  the  glass,  and  the  one  out  of  it,  who 
looked  at  each  other  with  eyes  of  heavenly  blue, 
deep  enough  to  hold  the  most  exquisite  meanings 
an  ingenious  beholder  could  put  into  them,  and 
deep  enough  to  hide  the  meanings  of  the  owner  if 
these  should  happen  to  be  less  exquisite.  Only  a 
few  children  in  Middlemarch  looked  blond  by  the 
side  of  Rosamond,  and  the  slim  figure  displayed  by 
her  riding-habit  had  delicate  undulations.  In  fact, 
most  men  in  Middlemarch,  except  her  brothers, 
held  that  Miss  Vincy  was  the  best  girl  in  the 
world,  and  some  called  her  an  angel.  Mary 
Garth,  on  the  contrary,  had  the  aspect  of  an  ordi- 
nary sinner :  she  was  brown ;  her  curly  dark  hair 
was  rough  and  stubborn ;  her  stature  was  low ;  and 
it  would  not  be  true  to  declare,  in  satisfactory 


MISS  BROOKE.  153 

antithesis,  that  she  had  all  the  virtues.  Plainness 
has  its  peculiar  temptations  and  vices  quite  as 
much  as  beauty ;  it  is  apt  either  to  feign  amiabil- 
ity, or,  not  feigning  it,  to  show  all  the  repulsive- 
ness  of  discontent :  at  any  rate,  to  be  called  an 
ugly  thing  in  contrast  with  that  lovely  creature 
your  companion,  is  apt  to  produce  some  effect  be- 
yond a  sense  of  fine  veracity  and  fitness  in  the 
phrase.  At  the  age  of  two-and-tweuty  Mary  had 
certainly  not  attained  that  perfect  good  sense  and 
good  principle  which  are  usually  recommended  to 
the  less  fortunate  girl,  as  if  they  were  to  be  ob- 
tained in  quantities  ready  mixed  with  a  flavour  of 
resignation  as  required.  Her  shrewdness  had  a 
streak  of  satiric  bitterness  continually  renewed  and 
never  carried  utterly  out  of  sight,  except  by  a 
strong  current  of  gratitude  towards  those  who,  in- 
stead of  telling  her  that  she  ought  to  be  contented, 
did  something  to  make  her  so.  Advancing  woman- 
hood had  tempered  her  plainness,  which  was  of  a 
good  human  sort,  such  as  the  mothers  of  our  race 
have  very  commonly  worn  in  all  latitudes  under  a 
more  or  less  becoming  headgear.  Eembrandt  would 
have  painted  her  with  pleasure,  and  would  have 
made  her  broad  features  look  out  of  the  canvas 
with  intelligent  honesty.  For  honesty,  truth- 
telling  fairness,  was  Mary's  reigning  virtue:  she 
neither  tried  to  create  illusions,  nor  indulged  in 
them  for  her  own  behoof,  and  when  she  was  in  a 
good  mood  she  had  humour  enough  in  her  to  laugh 
at  herself.  When  she  and  Eosamond  happened 
both  to  be  reflected  in  the  glass,  she  said 
laughingly,  — 

"  What  a  brown  patch  I  am  by  the  side  of  you, 
Posy !     You  are  the  most  unbecoming  companion.  * 


154  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  Oh,  no !  No  one  thinks  of  your  appearance, 
you  are  so  sensible  and  useful,  Mary.  Beauty  is 
of  very  little  consequence  in  reality, "  said  Rosa- 
mond, turning  her  head  towards  Mary,  but  with 
eyes  swerving  towards  the  new  view  of  her  neck 
in  the  glass. 

"  You  mean  my  beauty, "  said  Mary,  rather 
sardonically. 

Rosamond  thought,  "  Poor  Mary,  she  takes  the 
kindest  things  ill.  "  Aloud  she  said,  "  What  have 
you  been  doing  lately  ?  " 

"  I  ?  Oh,  minding  the  house,  —  pouring  out 
syrup, —  pretending  to  be  amiable  and  contented, 
— learning  to  have  a  bad  opinion  of  everybody.  " 

"  It  is  a  wretched  life  for  you.  " 

"  No, "  said  Mary,  curtly,  with  a  little  toss  of 
her  head.  "  I  think  my  life  is  pleasanter  than 
your  Miss  Morgan's. " 

"  Yes  ;  but  Miss  Morgan  is  so  uninteresting,  and 
not  young. " 

"  She  is  interesting  to  herself,  I  suppose ;  and  I 
am  not  at  all  sure  that  everything  gets  easier  as 
one  gets  older. " 

"  No, "  said  Rosamond,  reflectively ;  "  one  wonders 
what  such  people  do,  without  any  prospect.  To 
be  sure,  there  is  religion  as  a  support.  But, "  she 
added,  dimpling,  "  it  is  very  different  with  you, 
Mary.  You  may  have  an  offer. " 

"  Has  any  one  told  you  he  means  to  make  me  one  ?" 

"  Of  course  not.  I  mean,  there  is  a  gentleman 
who  may  fall  in  love  with  you,  seeing  you  almost 
every  day. " 

A  certain  change  in  Mary's  face  was  chiefly  de- 
termined by  the  resolve  not  to  show  any  change. 

"  Does  that  always  make  people  fall  in  love  ?  " 


MISS  BROOKE.  155 

she  answered  carelessly ;  "  it  seems  to  me  quite  as 
often  a  reason  for  detesting  each  other.  " 

"  Not  when  they  are  interesting  and  agreeable. 
I  hear  that  Mr.  Lydgate  is  both. " 

"  Oh,  Mr.  Lydgate ! "  said  Mary,  with  an  unmis- 
takable lapse  into  indifference.  "  You  want  to 
know  something  about  him, "  she  added,  not  choos- 
ing to  indulge  Eosamond's  indirectness. 

"  Merely,  how  you  like  him.  " 

"  There  is  no  question  of  liking  at  present.  My 
liking  always  wants  some  little  kindness  to  kindle 
it.  I  am  not  magnanimous  enough  to  like  people 
who  speak  to  me  without  seeming  to  see  me. " 

"  Is  he  so  haughty  ? "  said  Eosamond,  with 
heightened  satisfaction.  "  You  know  that  he  is 
of  good  family  ?  " 

"  No ;  he  did  not  give  that  as  a  reason.  " 

"  Mary  !  you  are  the  oddest  girl.  But  what  sort 
of  looking  man  is  he  ?  Describe  him  to  me.  " 

"  How  can  one  describe  a  man  ?  I  can  give  you 
an  inventory :  heavy  eyebrows,  dark  eyes,  a 
straight  nose,  thick  dark  hair,  large  solid  white 
hands  —  and  —  let  me  see  —  oh,  an  exquisite  cam- 
bric pocket-handkerchief.  But  you  will  see  him. 
You  know  this  is  about  the  time  of  his  visits.  " 

Eosamond  blushed  a  little,  but  said  medita- 
tively, "  I  rather  like  a  haughty  manner.  I  can- 
not endure  a  rattling  young  man.  " 

"  I  did  not  tell  you  that  Mr.  Lydgate  was 
haughty  ;  but  il  y  en  a  pour  tons  les  godts,  as  little 
Mamselle  used  to  say,  and  if  any  girl  can  choose 
the  particular  sort  of  conceit  she  would  like,  I 
should  think  it  is  you,  Eosy.  " 

"  Haughtiness  is  not  conceit ;  I  call  Fred 
conceited. " 


156  MIDULEMARCH. 

"  I  wish  no  one  said  any  worse  of  him.  He 
should  be  more  careful.  Mrs.  Waule  has  been 
telling  uncle  that  Fred  is  very  unsteady. "  Mary 
spoke  from  a  girlish  impulse  which  got  the  better 
of  her  judgment.  There  was  a  vague  uneasiness 
associated  with  the  word  "  unsteady  "  which  she 
hoped  Rosamond  might  say  something  to  dissipate. 
But  she  purposely  abstained  from  mentioning  Mrs. 
Waule 's  more  special  insinuation. 

"  Oh,  Fred  is  horrid !  "  said  Rosamond.  She 
would  not  have  allowed  herself  so  unsuitable  a 
word  to  any  one  but  Mary. 

"  What  do  you  mean  by  horrid  ?  " 

"  He  is  so  idle,  and  makes  papa  so  angry,  and 
says  he  will  not  take  orders. " 

"  I  think  Fred  is  quite  right.  " 

"  How  can  you  say  he  is  quite  right,  Mary  ?  I 
thought  you  had  more  sense  of  religion. " 

"  He  is  not  fit  to  be  a  clergyman.  " 

*  But  he  ought  to  be  fit.  " 

"  Well,  then,  he  is  not  what  he  ought  to  be. 
I  know  some  other  people  who  are  in  the  same 
case. " 

"  But  no  one  approves  of  them.  I  should  not 
like  to  marry  a  clergyman;  but  there  must  be 
clergymen. " 

"  It  does  not  follow  that  Fred  must  be  one. " 

"  But  when  papa  has  been  at  the  expense  of 
educating  him  for  it!  And  only  suppose,  if  he 
should  have  no  fortune  left  him  ?  " 

"  I  can  suppose  that  very  well, "  said  Mary, 
dryly. 

"  Then  I  wonder  you  can  defend  Fred, "  said 
Rosamond,  inclined  to  push  this  point. 

"  I  don't  defend  him,"  said  Mary,  laughing;  "  I 


MISS  BROOKE.  157 

would  defend  any  parish  from  having  him  for  a 
clergyman. " 

"  But  of  course  if  he  were  a  clergyman,  he  must 
be  different. " 

"  Yes,  he  would  be  a  great  hypocrite ;  and  he  is 
not  that  yet. " 

"  It  is  of  no  use  saying  anything  to  you,  Mary. 
You  always  take  Fred's  part. " 

"  Why  should  I  not  take  his  part  ?  "  said  Mary, 
lighting  up.  "  He  would  take  mine.  He  is  the 
only  person  who  takes  the  least  trouble  to  oblige 
me." 

"  You  make  me  feel  very  uncomfortable,  Mary, " 
said  Rosamond,  with  her  gravest  mildness ;  "  I 
would  not  tell  mamma  for  the  world. " 

"  What  would  you  not  tell  her  ?  "  said  Mary, 
angrily. 

"  Pray,  do  not  go  into  a  rage,  Mary, "  said  Rosa- 
mond, mildly  as  ever. 

"  If  your  mamma  is  afraid  that  Fred  will  make 
me  an  offer,  tell  her  that  I  would  not  marry  him 
if  he  asked  me.  But  he  is  not  going  to  do  so,  that 
I  am  aware.  He  certainly  never  has  asked  me. " 

"  Mary,  you  are  always  so  violent. " 

"  And  you  are  always  so  exasperating.  " 

"  I  ?     What  can  you  blame  me  for  ?  " 

"  Oh,  blameless  people  are  always  the  most  ex- 
asperating. There  is  the  bell,  — I  think  we  must 
go  down. " 

"  I  did  not  mean  to  quarrel, "  said  Rosamond, 
putting  on  her  hat. 

"  Quarrel  ?  Nonsense !  we  have  not  quarrelled. 
If  one  is  not  to  get  into  a  rage  sometimes,  what  is 
the  good  of  being  friends  ?  " 

"  Am  I  to  repeat  what  you  have  said  ? " 


IS8  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  Just  as  you  please.  I  never  say  what  I  am 
afraid  of  having  repeated.  But  let  us  go  down.  " 

Mr.  Lydgate  was  rather  late  this  morning,  but 
the  visitors  stayed  long  enough  to  see  him ;  for 
Mr.  Featherstone  asked  Eosamond  to  sing  to  him, 
and  she  herself  was  so  kind  as  to  propose  a  second 
favourite  song  of  his,  —  "  Flow  on,  thou  shining 
river, "  —  after  she  had  sung  "  Home,  sweet  home  " 
(which  she  detested).  This  hard-headed  old  Over- 
reach approved  of  the  sentimental  song,  as  the  sui- 
table garnish  for  girls,  and  also  as  fundamentally 
fine,  sentiment  being  the  right  thing  for  a  song. 

Mr.  Featherstone  was  still  applauding  the  last 
performance,  and  assuring  missy  that  her  voice 
was  as  clear  as  a  blackbird's,  when  Mr.  Lydgate 's 
horse  passed  the  window. 

His  dull  expectation  of  the  usual  disagreeable 
routine  with  an  aged  patient,  —  who  can  hardly 
believe  that  medicine  would  not  "  set  him  up  "  if 
the  doctor  were  only  clever  enough,  —  added  to  his 
general  disbelief  in  Middlemarch  charms,  made  a 
doubly  effective  background  to  this  vision  of  Eosa- 
mond, whom  old  Featherstone  made  haste  ostenta- 
tiously to  introduce  as  his  niece,  though  he  had 
never  thought  it  worth  while  to  speak  of  Mary 
Garth  in  that  light.  Nothing  escaped  Lydgate  in 
Eosamond's  graceful  behaviour:  how  delicately  she 
waived  the  notice  which  the  old  man's  want  of 
taste  had  thrust  upon  her  by  a  quiet  gravity,  not 
showing  her  dimples  on  the  wrong  occasion,  but 
showing  them  afterwards  in  speaking  to  Mary,  to 
whom  she  addressed  herself  with  so  much  good- 
natured  interest  that  Lydgate,  after  quickly  exam- 
ining Mary  more  fully  than  he  had  done  before, 
saw  an  adorable  kindness  in  Eosamond's  eyes. 


MISS  BROOKE.  159 

But  Mary  from  some  cause  looked  rather  out  of 
temper. 

"  Miss  Kosy  has  been  singing  me  a  song,  — 
you  've  nothing  to  say  against  that,  eh,  Doctor  ? " 
said  Mr.  Featherstone.  "  I  like  it  better  than 
your  physic. " 

"  That  has  made  me  forget  how  the  time  was 
going,"  said  Eosamond,  rising  to  reach  her  hat, 
which  she  had  laid  aside  before  singing,  so  that 
her  flower-like  head  on  its  white  stem  was  seen 
in  perfection  above  her  riding-habit.  "  Fred,  we 
must  really  go. " 

"  Very  good, "  said  Fred,  who  had  his  own  rea- 
sons for  not  being  in  the  best  spirits,  and  wanted 
to  get  away. 

"  Miss  Vincy  is  a  musician  ?  "  said  Lydgate, 
following  her  with  his  eyes.  (Every  nerve  and 
muscle  in  Rosamond  was  adjusted  to  the  conscious- 
ness that  she  was  being  looked  at.  She  was  by 
nature  an  actress  of  parts  that  entered  into  her 
physique :  she  even  acted  her  own  character,  and 
so  well  that  she  did  not  know  it  to  be  precisely 
her  own.) 

"  The  best  in  Middlemarch,  I  '11  be  bound,"  said 
Mr.  Featherstone,  "  let  the  next  be  who  she  will. 
Eh,  Fred  ?  Speak  up  for  your  sister. " 

"  I  'm  afraid  I  'm  out  of  court,  sir.  My  evidence 
would  be  good  for  nothing.  " 

"  Middlemarch  has  not  a  very  high  standard, 
uncle, "  said  Rosamond,  with  a  pretty  lightness, 
going  towards  her  whip,  which  lay  at  a  distance. 

Lydgate  was  quick  in  anticipating  her.  He 
reached  the  whip  before  she  did,  and  turned  to 
present  it  to  her.  She  bowed  and  looked  'at  him  : 
he  of  course  was  looking  at  her,  and  their  eyes 


160  MIDDLEMARCH. 

met  with  that  peculiar  meeting  which  is  never 
arrived  at  by  effort,  but  seems  like  a  sudden  divine 
clearance  of  haze.  I  think  Lydgate  turned  a  little 
paler  than  usual,  but  Rosamond  blushed  deeply 
and  felt  a  certain  astonishment.  After  that,  she 
was  really  anxious  to  go,  and  did  not  know  what 
sort  of  stupidity  her  uncle  was  talking  of  when 
she  went  to  shake  hands  with  him. 

Yet  this  result,  which  she  took  to  be  a  mutual 
impression,  called  falling  in  love,  was  just  what 
Rosamond  had  contemplated  beforehand.  Ever 
since  that  important  new  arrival  in  Middlemarch 
she  had  woven  a  little  future,  of  which  something 
like  this  scene  was  the  necessary  beginning. 
Strangers,  whether  wrecked  and  clinging  to  a  raft, 
or  duly  escorted  and  accompanied  by  portmanteaus, 
have  always  had  a  circumstantial  fascination  for 
the  virgin  mind,  against  which  native  merit  has 
urged  itself  in  vain.  And  a  stranger  was  abso- 
lutely necessary  to  Rosamond's  social  romance, 
which  had  always  turned  on  a  lover  and  bride- 
groom who  was  not  a  Middlemarcher,  and  who  had 
no  connections  at  all  like  her  own :  of  late,  indeed, 
the  construction  seemed  to  demand  that  he  should 
somehow  be  related  to  a  baronet.  Now  that  she 
and  the  stranger  had  met,  reality  proved  much 
more  moving  than  anticipation,  arid  Rosamond 
could  not  doubt  that  this  was  the  great  epoch  of 
her  life.  She  judged  of  her  own  symptoms  as 
those  of  awakening  love,  and  she  held  it  still  more 
natural  that  Mr.  Lydgate  should  have  fallen  in 
love  at  first  sight  of  her.  These  things  happened  so 
often  at  balls,  and  why  not  by  the  morning  light, 
when  the  complexion  showed  all  the  better  for  it  ? 
Rosamond,  though  no  older  than  Mary,  was  rather 


MISS  BROOKE.  161 

used  to  being  fallen  in  love  with ;  but  she,  for  her 
part,  had  remained  indifferent  and  fastidiously 
critical  towards  both  fresh  sprig  and  faded  bache- 
lor. And  here  was  Mr.  Lydgate  suddenly  corre- 
sponding to  her  ideal,  being  altogether  foreign  to 
Middlemarch,  carrying  a  certain  air  of  distinction 
congruous  with  good  family,  and  possessing  con- 
nections which  offered  vistas  of  that  middle-class 
heaven,  rank :  a  man  of  talent,  also,  whom  it 
would  be  especially  delightful  to  enslave :  in  fact, 
a  man  who  had  touched  her  nature  quite  newly, 
and  brought  a  vivid  interest  into  her  life  which 
was  better  than  any  fancied  "  might-be  "  such  as 
she  was  in  the  habit  of  opposing  to  the  actual. 

Thus,  in  riding  home,  both  the  brother  and  the 
sister  were  preoccupied  and  inclined  to  be  silent. 
Eosamond,  whose  basis  for  her  structure  had  the 
usual  airy  slightness,  was  of  remarkably  detailed 
and  realistic  imagination  when  the  foundation  had 
been  once  presupposed  ;  and  before  they  had  ridden 
a  mile  she  was  far  on  in  the  costume  and  introduc- 
tions of  her  wedded  life,  having  determined  ^on  her 
house  in  Middlemarch,  and  foreseen  the  visits  she 
would  pay  to  her  husband's  high-bred  relatives  at 
a  distance,  whose  finished  manners  she  could  ap- 
propriate as  thoroughly  as  she  had  done  her  school 
accomplishments,  preparing  herself  thus  for  vaguer 
elevations  which  might  ultimately  come.  There 
was  nothing  financial,  still  less  sordid,  in  her  pre- 
visions :  she  cared  about  what  were  considered 
refinements,  and  not  about  the  money  that  was  to 
pay  for  them. 

Fred's  mind,  on  the  other  hand,  was  busy  with 
an  anxiety  which  even  his  ready  hopefulness  could 
not  immediately  quell.  He  saw  no  way  of  eluding 

VOL.  I.— 11 


162  MIDDLEMARCH. 

Featherstone's  stupid  demand  without  incurring 
consequences  which  he  liked  less  even  than  the 
task  of  fulfilling  it.  His  father  was  already  out 
of  humour  with  him,  and  would  be  still  more  so 
if  he  were  the  occasion  of  any  additional  coolness 
between  his  own  family  and  the  Bulstrodes.  Then, 
he  himself  hated  having  to  go  and  speak  to  his 
uncle  Bulstrode,  and  perhaps  after  drinking  wine 
he  had  said  many  foolish  things  about  Feather- 
stone's  property,  and  these  had  been  magnified  by 
report.  Fred  felt  that  he  made  a  wretched  figure 
as  a  fellow  who  bragged  about  expectations  from 
a  queer  old  miser  like  Featherstone,  and  went  to 
beg  for  certificates  at  his  bidding.  But  —  those 
expectations.  He  really  had  them,  and  he  saw  no 
Rgreeable  alternative  if  he  gave  them  up ;  besides, 
he  had  lately  made  a  debt  which  galled  him  ex- 
tremely, and  old  Featherstone  had  almost  bargained 
to  pay  it  off.  The  whole  affair  was  miserably 
small :  his  debts  were  small,  even  his  expectations 
were  not  anything  so  very  magnificent.  Fred  had 
known  men  to  whom  he  would  have  been  ashamed 
of  confessing  the  smallness  of  his  scrapes.  Such 
ruminations  naturally  produced  a  streak  of  misan- 
thropic bitterness.  To  be  born  the  son  of  a  Mid- 
dlemarch  manufacturer,  and  inevitable  heir  to 
nothing  in  particular,  while  such  men  as  Mainwar- 
ing  and  Vyan  —  certainly  life  was  a  poor  business, 
when  a  spirited  young  fellow,  with  a  good  appetite 
for  the  best  of  everything,  had  so  poor  an  outlook. 

It  had  not  occurred  to  Fred  that  the  introduction 
of  Bulstrode 's  name  in  the  matter  was  a  fiction  of 
old  Featherstone's;  nor  could  this  have  made  any 
difference  to  his  position.  He  saw  plainly  enough 
that  the  old  man  wanted  to  exercise  his  power  by 


MISS  BROOKE.  163 

tormenting  him  a  little,  and  also  probably  to  get 
some  satisfaction  out  of  seeing  him  on  unpleasant 
terms  with  Bulstrode.  Fred  fancied  that  he  saw 
to  the  bottom  of  his  uncle  Featherstone's  soul, 
though  in  reality  half  what  he  saw  there  was  no 
more  than  the  reflex  of  his  own  inclinations.  The 
difficult  task  of  knowing  another  soul  is  not  for 
young  gentlemen  whose  consciousness  is  chiefly 
made  up  of  their  own  wishes. 

Fred's  main  point  of  debate  with  himself  was, 
whether  he  should  tell  his  father,  or  try  to  get 
through  the  affair  without  his  father's  knowledge. 
It  was  probably  Mrs.  Waule  who  had  been  talking 
about  him ;  and  if  Mary  Garth  had  repeated  Mrs. 
Waule 's  report  to  Eosamond,  it  would  be  sure  to 
reach  his  father,  who  would  as  surely  question 
him  about  it.  He  said  to  Rosamond,  as  they 
slackened  their  pace,  — 

"  Rosy,  did  Mary  tell  you  that  Mrs.  Waule 
had  said  anything  about  me  ? " 

"  Yes,  indeed,  she  did.  " 

"What?" 

"  That  you  were  very  unsteady. " 

"  Was  that  all  ?  " 

"  I  should  think  that  was  enough,  Fred. " 

"  You  are  sure  she  said  no  more  ?  " 

"  Mary  mentioned  nothing  else.  But  really, 
Fred,  I  think  you  ought  to  be  ashamed. " 

"Oh,  fudge!  Don't  lecture  me.  What  did 
Mary  say  about  it  ? " 

"  I  am  not  obliged  to  tell  you.  You  care  so 
very  much  what  Mary  says,  and  you  are  too  rude 
to  allow  me  to  speak. " 

"  Of  course  I  care  what  Mary  says.  She  is  the 
best  girl  I  know. " 


1 64  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  I  should  never  have  thought  she  was  a  girl  to 
fall  in  love  with. " 

"  How  do  you  know  what  men  would  fall  in 
love  with  ?  Girls  never  know.  " 

"  At  least,  Fred,  let  me  advise  you  not  to  fall  in 
love  with  her,  for  she  says  she  would  not  marry 
you  if  you  asked  her. " 

"  She  might  have  waited  till  I  did  ask  her. " 

"  I  knew  it  would  nettle  you,  Fred.  " 

"  Not  at  all.  She  would  not  have  said  so  if  you 
had  not  provoked  her. " 

Before  reaching  home,  Fred  concluded  that  he 
would  tell  the  whole  affair  as  simply  as  possible 
to  his  father,  who  might  perhaps  take  on  himself 
the  unpleasant  business  of  speaking  to  Bulstrode. 


BOOK    II. 

OLD  AJSTD  YOUNG. 
CHAPTER   XIII. 

"  1st  Gent.  How  class  your  man  ?  — as  better  than  the  mos*, 
Or,  seeming  better,  worse  beneath  that  cloak  1 
As  saint  or  knave,  pilgrim  or  hypocrite  ? 
2d  Gent.    Nay,  tell  me  how  you  class  your  wealth  of  books, 
The  drifted  relics  of  all  time.    As  well 
Sort  them  at  once  by  size  and  livery  : 
Vellum,  tall  copies,  and  the  common  calf 
Will  hardly  cover  more  diversity 
Than  all  your  labels  cunningly  devised 
To  class  your  unread  authors." 

IN  consequence  of  what  he  had  heard  from  Fred, 
Mr.  Vincy  determined  to  speak  with  Mr.  Bulstrode 
in  his  private  room  at  the  Bank  at  half-past  one, 
when  he  was  usually  free  from  other  callers.  But 
a  visitor  had  come  in  at  one  o'clock,  and  Mr.  Bui- 
strode  had  so  much  to  say  to  him  that  there  was 
little  chance  of  the  interview  being  over  in  half  an 
hour.  The  banker's  speech  was  fluent,  but  it  was 
also  copious,  and  he  used  up  an  appreciable  amount 
of  time  in  brief  meditative  pauses.  Do  not  ima- 
gine his  sickly  aspect  to  have  been  of  the  yellow, 
black -haired  sort :  he  had  a  pale  blond  skin,  thin 
gray-besprinkled  brown  hair,  light-gray  eyes,  and  a 
large  forehead.  Loud  men  called  his  subdued  tone 
an  undertone,  and  sometimes  implied  that  it  was 


1 66  MIDDLEMARCH. 

inconsistent  with  openness ;  though  there  seems  to 
be  no  reason  why  a  loud  man  should  not  be  given 
to  concealment  of  anything  except  his  own  voice, 
unless  it  can  be  shown  that  Holy  Writ  has  placed 
the  seat  of  candour  in  the  lungs.  Mr.  Bulstrode 
had  also  a  deferential  bending  attitude  in  listening, 
and  an  apparently  fixed  attentiveness  in  his  eyes 
which  made  those  persons  who  thought  themselves 
worth  hearing  infer  that  he  was  seeking  the  utmost 
improvement  from  their  discourse.  Others,  who 
expected  to  make  no  great  figure,  disliked  this  kind 
of  moral  lantern  turned  on  them.  If  you  are  not 
proud  of  your  cellar,  there  is  no  thrill  of  satisfac- 
tion in  seeing  your  guest  hold  up  his  wine-glass  to 
the  light  and  look  judicial.  Such  joys  are  reserved 
for  conscious  merit.  Hence  Mr.  Bulstrode's  close 
attention  was  not  agreeable  to  the  publicans  and 
sinners  in  Middlemarch  ;  it  was  attributed  by  some 
to  his  being  a  Pharisee,  and  by  others  to  his  being 
Evangelical.  Less  superficial  reasoners  among  them 
wished  to  know  who  his  father  and  grandfather 
were,  observing  that  five-and-twenty  years  ago 
nobody  had  ever  heard  of  a  Bulstrode  in  Middle- 
march.  To  his  present  visitor,  Lydgate,  the  scru- 
tinizing look  was  a  matter  of  indifference :  he 
simply  formed  an  unfavourable  opinion  of  the 
banker's  constitution,  and  concluded  that  he  had 
an  eager  inward  life  with  little  enjoyment  of  tan- 
gible things. 

"  I  shall  be  exceedingly  obliged  if  you  will  look  in 
on  me  here  occasionally,  Mr.  Lydgate,"  the  banker 
observed,  after  a  brief  pause.  "  If,  as  I  dare  to  hope, 
I  have  the  privilege  of  finding  you  a  valuable  coad- 
jutor in  the  interesting  matter  of  hospital  manage- 
ment, there  will  be  many  questions  which  we  shall 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  167 

need  to  discuss  in  private.  As  to  the  new  hospital, 
which  is  nearly  finished,  I  shall  consider  what  you 
have  said  about  the  advantages  of  the  special 
destination  for  fevers.  The  decision  will  rest  with 
me,  for  though  Lord  Medlicote  has  given  the  land 
and  timber  for  the  building,  he  is  not  disposed  to 
give  his  personal  attention  to  the  object." 

"  There  are  few  things  better  worth  the  pains  in 
a  provincial  town  like  this,"  said  Lydgate.  "A 
fine  fever  hospital  in  addition  to  the  old  infirmary 
might  be  the  nucleus  of  a  medical  school  here, 
when  once  we  get  our  medical  reforms  ;  and  what 
would  do  more  for  medical  education  than  the 
spread  of  such  schools  over  the  country  ?  A  born 
provincial  man  who  has  a  grain  of  public  spirit  as 
well  as  a  few  ideas,  should  do  what  he  can  to 
resist  the  rush  of  everything  that  is  a  little  better 
than  common  towards  London.  Any  valid  pro- 
fessional aims  may  often  find  a  freer,  if  not  a  richer 
field,  in  the  provinces." 

One  of  Lydgate's  gifts  was  a  voice  habitually 
deep  and  sonorous,  yet  capable  of  becoming  very 
low  and  gentle  at  the  right  moment.  About  his 
ordinary  bearing  there  was  a  certain  fling,  a  fear- 
less expectation  of  success,  a  confidence  in  his ,  own 
powers  and  integrity  much  fortified  by  contempt 
for  petty  obstacles  or  seductions  of  which  he  had 
had  no  experience.  But  this  proud  openness  was 
made  lovable  by  an  expression  of  unaffected  good- 
will. Mr.  Bulstrode  perhaps  liked  him  the  better 
for  the  difference  between  them  in  pitch  and  man- 
ners ;  he  certainly  liked  him  the  better,  as  Eosa- 
mond  did,  for  being  a  stranger  in  Middlemarch. 
One  can  begin  so  many  things  with  a  new  person ! 
—  even  begin  to  be  a  better  man. 


1 68  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  I  shall  rejoice  to  furnish  your  zeal  with  fuller 
opportunities,"  Mr.  Bulstrode  answered ;  "  I  mean, 
by  confiding  to  you  the  superintendence  of  my  new 
hospital,  should  a  maturer  knowledge  favour  that 
issue,  for  I  am  determined  that  so  great  an  object 
shall  not  be  shackled  by  our  two  physicians.  In- 
deed, I  am  encouraged  to  consider  your  advent 
to  this  town  as  a  gracious  indication  that  a  more 
manifest  blessing  is  now  to  be  awarded  to  my 
efforts,  which  have  hitherto  been  much  withstood. 
With  regard  to  the  old  infirmary,  we  have  gained 
the  initial  point,  —  I  mean  your  election.  And 
now  I  hope  you  will  not  shrink  from  incurring  a 
certain  amount  of  jealousy  and  dislike  from  your 
professional  brethren  by  presenting  yourself  as  a 
reformer." 

"  I  will  not  profess  bravery,"  said  Lydgate,  smil- 
ing, "  but  I  acknowledge  a  good  deal  of  pleasure  in 
fighting,  and  I  should  not  care  for  my  profession,  if 
I  did  not  believe  that  better  methods  were  to  be 
found  and  enforced  there  as  well  as  everywhere 
else  " 

"The  standard  of  that  profession  is  low  in  Middle- 
march,  my  dear  sir,"  said  the  banker.  "  I  mean  in 
knowledge  and  skill ;  not  in  social  status,  for  our 
medical  men  are  most  of  them  connected  with 
respectable  townspeople  here.  My  own  imperfect 
health  has  induced  me  to  give  some  attention  to 
those  palliative  resources  which  the  divine  mercy 
has  placed  within  our  reach.  I  have  consulted 
eminent  men  in  the  metropolis,  and  I  am  painfully 
aware  of  the  backwardness  under  which  medical 
treatment  labours  in  our  provincial  districts." 

"Yes;  with  our  present  medical  rules  and  edu- 
cation, one  must  be  satisfied  now  and  then  to  meet 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  169 

with  a  fair  practitioner.  As  to  all  the  higher  ques- 
tions which  determine  the  starting-point  of  a  diag- 
nosis,—  as  to  the  philosophy  of  medical  evidence, 
—  any  glimmering  of  these  can  only  come  from 
a  scientific  culture  of  which  country  practitioners 
have  usually  no  more  notion  than  the  man  in  the 
moon." 

Mr.  Bulstrode,  bending  and  looking  intently, 
found  the  form  which  Lydgate  had  given  to  his 
agreement  not  quite  suited  to  his  comprehension. 
Under  such  circumstances  a  judicious  man  changes 
the  topic,  and  enters  on  ground  where  his  own  gifts 
may  be  more  useful. 

"  I  am  aware,"  he  said,  "  that  the  peculiar  bias  of 
medical  ability  is  towards  material  means.  Never- 
theless, Mr.  Lydgate,  I  hope  we  shall  not  vary  in 
sentiment  as  to  a  measure  in  which  you  are  not 
likely  to  be  actively  concerned,  but  in  which  your 
sympathetic  concurrence  may  be  an  aid  to  me.  You 
recognize,  I  hope,  the  existence  of  spiritual  interests 
in  your  patients  ?  " 

"  Certainly  I  do.  But  those  words  are  apt  to 
cover  different  meanings  to  different  minds." 

"  Precisely.  And  on  such  subjects  wrong  teach- 
ing is  as  fatal  as  no  teaching.  Now  a  point  which 
I  have  much  at  heart  to  secure  is  a  new  regulation 
as  to  clerical  attendance  at  the  old  infirmary.  The 
building  stands  in  Mr.  Farebrother's  parish.  You 
know  Mr.  Farebrother  ? " 

"  I  have  seen  him.  He  gave  me  his  vote.  I 
must  call  to  thank  him.  He  seems  a  very  bright 
pleasant  little  fellow.  And  I  understand  he  is  a 
naturalist." 

"  Mr.  Farebrother,  my  dear  sir,  is  a  man  deeply 
painful  to  contemplate.  I  suppose  there  is  not  a 


i;o  MIDDLEMARCH. 

clergyman  in  this  country  who  has  greater  talents." 
Mr.  Bulstrode  paused,  and  looked  meditative. 

"  I  have  not  yet  been  pained  by  finding  any 
excessive  talent  in  Middlemarch,"  said  Lydgate, 
bluntly. 

"  What  I  desire,"  Mr.  Bulstrode  continued,  look- 
ing still  more  serious,  "  is  that  Mr.  Farebrother's 
attendance  at  the  hospital  should  be  superseded  by 
the  appointment  of  a  chaplain,  —  of  Mr.  Tyke,  in 
fact,  —  and  that  no  other  spiritual  aid  should  be 
called  in." 

"  As  a  medical  man  I  could  have  no  opinion  on 
such  a  point  unless  I  knew  Mr.  Tyke,  and  even 
then  I  should  require  to  know  the  cases  in  which 
he  was  applied."  Lydgate  smiled,  but  he  was  bent 
on  being  circumspect. 

"  Of  course  you  cannot  enter  fully  into  the  merits 
of  this  measure  at  present.  But "  —  here  Mr.  Bul- 
strode began  to  speak  with  a  more  chiselled  em- 
phasis — "  the  subject  is  likely  to  be  referred  to 
the  medical  board  of  the  infirmary,  and  what  I  trust 
I  may  ask  of  you  is,  that  in  virtue  of  the  co-opera- 
tion between  us  which  I  now  look  forward  to,  you 
will  not,  so  far  as  you  are  concerned,  be  influenced 
by  my  opponents  in  this  matter." 

"  I  hope  I  shall  have  nothing  to  do  with  clerical 
disputes,"  said  Lydgate.  "  The  path  I  have  chosen 
is  to  work  well  in  my  own  profession." 

"  My  responsibility,  Mr.  Lydgate,  is  of  a  broader 
kind.  With  me,  indeed,  this  question  is  one  of 
sacred  accountableness ;  whereas  with  my  oppo- 
nents, I  have  good  reason  to  say  that  it  is  an  occa- 
sion for  gratifying  a  spirit  of  worldly  opposition. 
But  I  shall  not  therefore  drop  one  iota  of  my  con- 
victions, or  cease  to  identify  myself  with  that  truth 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  171 

which  an  evil  generation  hates.  I  have  devoted 
myself  to  this  object  of  hospital-improvement,  but 
I  will  boldly  confess  to  you,  Mr.  Lydgate,  that  I 
should  have  no  interest  in  hospitals  if  I  believed  that 
nothing  more  was  concerned  therein  than  the  cure 
of  mortal  diseases.  I  have  another  ground  of  action, 
and  in  the  face  of  persecution  I  will  not  conceal  it." 

Mr.  Bulstrode's  voice  had  become  a  loud  and 
agitated  whisper  as  he  said  the  last  words. 

"  There  we  certainly  differ,"  said  Lydgate.  But 
he  was  not  sorry  that  the  door  was  now  opened,  and 
Mr.  Vincy  was  announced.  That  florid  sociable 
personage  was  become  more  interesting  to  him  since 
he  had  seen  Rosamond  Not  that,  like  her,  he  had 
been  weaving  any  future  in  which  their  lots  were 
united  ;  but  a  man  naturally  remembers  a  charming 
girl  with  pleasure,  and  is  willing  to  dine  where  he 
may  see  her  again.  Before  he  took  leave,  Mr.  Vincy 
had  given  that  invitation  which  he  had  been  "  in  no 
hurry  about,"  for  Rosamond  at  breakfast  had  men- 
tioned that  she  thought  her  uncle  Featherstone  had 
taken  the  new  doctor  into  great  favour. 

Mr.  Bulstrode,  alone  with  his  brother-in-law, 
poured  himself  out  a  glass  of  water,  and  opened  a 
sandwich-box. 

"  I  cannot  persuade  you  to  adopt  my  regimen, 
Vincy  ? " 

"  No,  no  ;  I  Ve  no  opinion  of  that  system.  Life 
wants  padding,"  said  Mr.  Vincy,  unable  to  omit  his 
portable  theory.  "  However,"  he  went  on,  accenting 
the  word,  as  if  to  dismiss  all  irrelevance,  "  what  I 
came  here  to  talk  about  was  a  little  affair  of  my 
young  scapegrace,  Fred's." 

"  That  is  a  subject  on  which  you  and  I  are  likely 
to  take  quite  as  different  views  as  on  diet,  Vincy." 


i;2  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  I  hope  not  this  time."  (Mr.  Vincy  was  resolved 
to  be  good-humoured.)  "  The  fact  is,  it 's  about  a 
whim  of  old  Featherstone's.  Somebody  has  been 
cooking  mp  a  story  out  of  spite,  and  telling  it  to  the 
old  man,  to  try  to  set  him  against  Fred.  He  's  very 
fond  of  Fred,  and  is  likely  to  do  something  hand- 
some for  him  ;  indeed  he  has  as  good  as  told  Fred 
that  he  means  to  leave  him  his  land,  and  that  makes 
other  people  jealous." 

"  Vincy,  I  must  repeat  that  you  will  not  get  any 
concurrence  from  me  as  to  the  course  you  have  pur- 
sued with  your  eldest  son.  It  was  entirely  from 
worldly  vanity  that  you  destined  him  for  the  Church : 
with  a  family  of  three  sons  and  four  daughters,  you 
were  not  warranted  in  devoting  money  to  an  expen- 
sive education  which  has  succeeded  in  nothing  but 
in  giving  him  extravagant  idle  habits.  You  are  now 
reaping  the  consequences." 

To  point  out  other  people's  errors  was  a  duty  that 
Mr.  Bulstrode  rarely  shrank  from,  but  Mr.  Vincy 
was  not  equally  prepared  to  be  patient.  When  a 
man  has  the  immediate  prospect  of  being  mayor, 
and  is  ready,  in  the  interests  of  commerce,  to  take 
up  a  firm  attitude  on  politics  generally,  he  has  natu- 
rally a  sense  of  his  importance  to  the  framework  of 
things  which  seems  to  throw  questions  of  private 
conduct  into  the  background.  And  this  particular 
reproof  irritated  him  more  than  any  other.  It  was 
eminently  superfluous  to  him  to  be  told  that  he  was 
reaping  the  consequences.  But  he  felt  his  neck 
under  Bulstrode's  yoke ;  and  though  he  usually 
enjoyed  kicking,  he  was  anxious  to  refrain  from  that 
relief. 

"  As  to  that,  Bulstrode,  it 's  no  use  going  back. 
I  'm  not  one  of  your  pattern  men,  and  I  don't  pre- 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  173 

tend  to  be.  I  couldn't  foresee  everything  in  the 
trade  ;  there  wasn't  a  finer  business  in  Middlemarch 
than  ours,  and  the  lad  was  clever.  My  poor  brother 
was  in  the  Church,  and  would  have  done  well  — • 
had  got  preferment  already,  but  that  stomach  fever 
took  him  off:  else  he  might  have  been  a  dean  by 
this  time.  I  think  I  was  justified  in  what  I  tried 
to  do  for  Fred.  If  you  come  to  religion,  it  seems  to 
me  a  man  shouldn't  want  to  carve  out  his  meat 
to  an  ounce  beforehand :  one  must  trust  a  little  to 
Providence  and  be  generous.  It 's  a  good  British 
feeling  to  try  and  raise  your  family  a  little :  in  my 
opinion,  it 's  a  father's  duty  to  give  his  sons  a  fine 
chance." 

"  I  don't  wish  to  act  otherwise  than  as  your  best 
friend,  Vincy,  when  I  say  that  what  you  have  been 
uttering  just  now  is  one  mass  of  worldliness  and 
inconsistent  folly." 

"  Very  well,"  said  Mr.  Vincy,  kicking  in  spite  of 
resolutions,  "  I  never  professed  to  be  anything  but 
worldly ;  and,  what 's  more,  I  don't  see  anybody 
else  who  is  not  worldly.  I  suppose  you  don't  con- 
duct business  on  what  you  call  unworldly  principles. 
The  only  difference  I  see  is  that  one  worldliness  is  a 
little  bit  honester  than  another." 

"This  kind  of  discussion  is  unfruitful,  Vincy," 
said  Mr.  Bulstrode,  who,  finishing  his  sandwich,  had 
thrown  himself  back  in  his  chair,  and  shaded  his 
eyes  as  if  weary.  "  You  had  some  more  particular 
business." 

"  Yes,  yes.  The  long  and  short  of  it  is,  somebody 
has  told  old  Featherstone,  giving  you  as  the  author- 
ity, that  Fred  has  been  borrowing  or  trying  to 
borrow  money  on  the  prospect  of  his  land.  Of 
course  you  never  said  any  such  nonsense.  But  the 


174  MIDDLEMARCH. 

old  fellow  will  insist  on  it  that  Fred  should  bring 
him  a  denial  in  your  handwriting ;  that  is,  just  a 
Lit  of  a  note  saying  you  don't  believe  a  word  of  such 
stuff,  either  of  his  having  borrowed  or  tried  to  borrow 
in  such  a  fool's  way.  I  suppose  you  can  have  no 
objection  to  do  that." 

"  Pardon  me.  I  have  an  objection.  I  am  by  no 
means  sure  that  your  son,  in  his  recklessness  and 
ignorance,  —  I  will  use  no  severer  word,  —  has  not 
tried  to  raise  money  by  holding  out  his  future  pros- 
pects, or  even  that  some  one  may  not  have  been 
foolish  enough  to  supply  him  on  so  vague  a  pre- 
sumption :  there  is  plenty  of  such  lax  money-lend- 
ing as  of  other  folly  in  the  world." 

"  But  Fred  gives  me  his  honour  that  he  has 
never  borrowed  money  on  the  pretence  of  any 
understanding  about  his  uncle's  land.  He  is  not  a 
liar.  I  don't  want  to  make  him  better  than  he  is. 
I  have  blown  him  up  well  —  nobody  can  say  I  wink 
at  what  he  does.  But  he  is  not  a  liar.  And  I  should 
have  thought  —  but  I  may  be  wrong  —  that  there 
was  no  religion  to  hinder  a  man  from  believing 
the  best  of  a  young  fellow,  when  you  don't  know 
worse.  It  seems  to  me  it  would  be  a  poor  sort  of 
religion  to  put  a  spoke  in  his  wheel  by  refusing 
to  say  you  don't  believe  such  harm  of  him  as 
you've  got  no  good  reason  to  believe." 

"  I  am  not  at  all  sure  that  I  should  be  befriend- 
ing your  son  by  smoothing  his  way  to  the  future 
possession  of  Featherstone's  property.  I  cannot 
regard  wealth  as  a  blessing  to  those  who  use  it 
simply  as  a  harvest  for  this  world.  You  do  not 
like  to  hear  these  things,  Vincy,  but  on  this  occa- 
sion I  feel  called  upon  to  tell  you  that  I  have  no 
motive  for  furthering  such  a  disposition  of  prop- 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  175 

erty  as  that  which  you  refer  to.  I  do  not  shrink 
from  saying  that  it  will  not  tend  to  your  son's 
eternal  welfare  or  to  the  glory  of  God.  Why  then 
should  you  expect  me  to  pen  this  kind  of  affidavit, 
which  has  no  object  but  to  keep  up  a  foolish  par- 
tiality and  secure  a  foolish  bequest  ? " 

"  If  you  mean  to  hinder  everybody  from  having 
money  but  saints  and  evangelists,  you  must  give 
up  some  profitable  partnerships,  that's  all  I  can 
say,"  Mr.  Vincy  burst  out  very  bluntly.  "  It 
may  be  for  the  glory  of  God,  but  it  is  not  for 
the  glory  of  the  Middlemarch  trade,  that  Plym- 
dale's  house  uses  those  blue  and  green  dyes  it 
gets  from  the  Brassing  manufactory ;  they  rot  the 
silk,  that 's  all  I  know  about  it.  Perhaps  if  other 
people  knew  so  much  of  the  profit  went  to  the 
glory  of  God,  they  might  like  it  better.  But  I 
don't  mind  so  much  about  that  —  I  could  get  up 
a  pretty  row,  if  I  chose." 

Mr.  Bulstrode  paused  a  little  before  he  answered : 
"  You  pain  me  very  much  by  speaking  in  this  way, 
Vincy.  I  do  not  expect  you  to  understand  my 
grounds  of  action  —  it  is  not  an  easy  thing  even  to 
thread  a  path  for  principles  in  the  intricacies  of 
the  world — still  less  to  make  the  thread  clear  for 
the  careless  and  the  scoffing.  You  must  remember,  if 
you  please,  that  I  stretch  my  tolerance  towards  you 
as  my  wife's  brother,  and  that  it  little  becomes  you 
to  complain  of  me  as  withholding  material  help 
towards  the  worldly  position  of  your  family.  I 
must  remind  you  that  it  is  not  your  own  pru- 
dence or  judgment  that  has  enabled  you  to  keep 
your  place  in  the  trade." 

"  Very  likely  not ;  but  you  have  been  no  loser 
by  my  trade  yet,"  said  Mr.  Vincy,  thoroughly  net- 


176  MIDDLEMARCH. 

tied  (a  result  which  was  seldom  much  retarded  by 
previous  resolutions).  "And  when  you  married 
Harriet,  I  don't  see  how  you  could  expect  that  our 
families  should  not  hang  by  the  same  nail.  If 
you  've  changed  your  mind,  and  want  my  family  to 
come  down  in  the  world,  you'd  better  say  so.  I  've 
never  changed;  I'm  a  plain  Churchman  now,  just 
as  I  used  to  be  before  doctrines  came  up.  I  take 
the  world  as  I  find  it,  in  trade  and  everything  else. 
I  'm  contented  to  be  no  worse  than  my  neighbours. 
But  if  you  want  us  to  come  down  in  the  world,  say 
so.  I  shall  know  better  what  to  do  then." 

"  You  talk  unreasonably.  Shall  you  come  down 
in  the  world  for  want  of  this  letter  about  your  son  ? " 

"  Well,  whether  or  not,  I  consider  it  very  unhand- 
some of  you  to  refuse  it.  Such  doings  may  be  lined 
with  religion,  but  outside  they  have  a  nasty,  dog-in- 
the-manger  look.  You  might  as  well  slander  Fred : 
it  comes  pretty  near  to  it  when  you  refuse  to  say 
you  didn't  set  a  slander  going.  It's  this  sort  of 
thing  —  this  tyrannical  spirit,  wanting  to  play 
bishop  and  banker  everywhere  —  it's  this  sort  of 
thing  makes  a  man's  name  stink." 

"  Vincy,  if  you  insist  on  quarrelling  with  me,  it 
will  be  exceedingly  painful  to  Harriet  as  well  as 
myself,"  said  Mr.  Bulstrode,  with  a  trifle  more 
eagerness  and  paleness  than  usual. 

"  I  don't  want  to  quarrel.  It 's  for  my  interest  — 
and  perhaps  for  yours  too  —  that  we  should  be 
friends.  I  bear  you  no  grudge ;  I  think  no  worse 
of  you  than  I  do  of  other  people.  A  man  who  half 
starves  himself,  and  goes  the  length  in  family 
prayers,  and  so  on,  that  you  do,  believes  in  his 
religion  whatever  it  may  be :  you  could  turn  over 
your  capital  just  as  fast  with  cursing  and  swearing, 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  177 

—  plenty  of  fellows  do.  You  like  to  be  master, 
there's  no  denying  that;  you  must  be  first  chop 
in  heaven,  else  you  won't  like  it  much.  But  you  're 
my  sister's  husband,  and  we  ought  to  stick  together ; 
and  if  I  know  Harriet,  she  '11  consider  it  your  fault 
if  we  quarrel  because  you  strain  at  a  gnat  in  this 
way,  and  refuse  to  do  Fred  a  good  turn.  And  I 
don't  mean  to  say  I  shall  bear  it  well.  I  consider 
it  unhandsome." 

Mr.  Vincy  rose,  began  to  button  his  great-coat, 
and  looked  steadily  at  his  brother-in-law,  meaning 
to  imply  a  demand  for  a  decisive  answer. 

This  was  not  the  first  time  that  Mr.  Bulstrode 
had  begun  by  admonishing  Mr.  Vincy,  and  had 
ended  by  seeing  a  very  unsatisfactory  reflection 
of  himself  in  the  coarse  unflattering  mirror  which 
that  manufacturer's  mind  presented  to  the  subtler 
lights  and  shadows  of  his  fellow-men ;  and  perhaps 
his  experience  ought  to  have  warned  him  how  the 
scene  would  end.  But  a  full-fed  fountain  will  be 
generous  with  its  waters  even  in  the  rain,  when 
they  are  worse  than  useless ;  and  a  fine  fount  of 
admonition  is  apt  to  be  equally  irrepressible. 

It  was  not  in  Mr.  Bulstrode's  nature  to  comply 
directly  in  consequence  of  uncomfortable  sugges- 
tions. Before  changing  his  course,  he  always 
needed  to  shape  his  motives  and  bring  them  into 
accordance  with  his  habitual  standard.  He  said, 
at  last,  — 

"I  will  reflect  a  little,  Vincy.  I  will  mention 
the  subject  to  Harriet.  I  shall  probably  send  you 
a  letter." 

"  Very  well.  As  soon  as  you  can,  please.  I  hope 
it  will  all  be  settled  before  I  see  you  to-morrow." 

VOL.  I.  —  12 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

"  Follows  here  the  strict  receipt 

For  that  sauce  to  dainty  meat, 

Named  Idleness,  which  many  eat 

By  preference,  and  call  it  sweet : 
First  watch  for  morsels,  like  a  hound, 
Mix  well  with  buffets,  stir  them  round 
With  good  thick  oil  of  flatteries, 
And  froth  with  mean  self-lauding  lies. 
Serve  warm :  the  vessels  you  must  choose 
To  keep  it  in  are  dead  men's  shoes." 

MR.  BULSTRODE'S  consultation  of  Harriet  seemed  to 
have  had  the  effect  desired  by  Mr.  Viricy,  for  early 
the  next  morning  a  letter  came  which  Fred  could 
carry  to  Mr.  Featherstone  as  the  required  testimony. 

The  old  gentleman  was  staying  in  bed  on  account 
of  the  cold  weather,  and  as  Mary  Garth  was  not  to  be 
seen  in  the  sitting-room,  Fred  went  upstairs  imme- 
diately and  presented  the  letter  to  his  uncle,  who, 
propped  up  comfortably  on  a  bed-rest,  was  not  less 
able  than  usual  to  enjoy  his  consciousness  of  wisdom 
in  distrusting  and  frustrating  mankind.  He  put  on 
his  spectacles  to  read  the  letter,  pursing  up  his  lips 
and  drawing  down  their  corners. 

"  Under  the  circumstances,  I  will  'not  decline  to 
state  my  conviction,  —  tchah!  what  fine  words  the 
fellow  puts  !  He 's  as  fine  as  an  auctioneer  —  that 
your  son  Frederic  has  not  obtained  any  advance  of 
money  on  bequests  promised  by  Mr.  Featherstone  — 
promised  ?  who  said  I  had  ever  promised  ?  I  promise 
nothing  —  I  shall  make  codicils  as  long  as  I  like  — • 
and  that  considering  the  nature  of  such  a  proceeding,  it 


OLI>  AND  YOUNG.  179 

is  unreasonable  to  presume  that  a  young  man  of  sense 
and  character  would  attempt  it,  —  ah,  but  the  gentle- 
man does  n't  say  you  are  a  young  man  of  sense  and 
character,  mark  you  that,  sir !  —  As  to  my  own  con- 
cern with  any  report  of  such  a  nature,  I  distinctly  af- 
firm that  I  never  made  any  statement  to  the  effect  that 
your  son  had  'borrowed  money  on  any  property  that 
might  accrue  to  him  on  Mr.  Feather  stone's  demise 
—  bless  my  heart !  '  property '  —  accrue  —  demise ! 
Lawyer  Standish  is  nothing  to  him.  He  could  n't 
speak  finer  if  he  wanted  to  borrow.  Well,"  Mr. 
Featherstone  here  looked  over  his  spectacles  at 
Fred,  while  he  handed  back  the  letter  to  him  with 
a  contemptuous  gesture,  "  you  don't  suppose  I 
believe  a  thing  because  Bulstrode  writes  it  out 
fine,  eh?" 

Fred  coloured.  "  You  wished  to  have  the  letter, 
sir.  I  should  think  it  very  likely  that  Mr.  Bul- 
strode's  denial  is  as  good  as  the  authority  which 
told  you  what  he  denies." 

"  Every  bit.  I  never  said  I  believed  either  one  or 
the  other.  And  now  what  d' you  expect?"  said 
Mr.  Featherstone,  curtly,  keeping  on  his  spectacles, 
but  withdrawing  his  hands  under  his  wraps. 

"  I  expect  nothing,  sir."  Fred  with  difficulty 
restrained  himself  from  venting  his  irritation.  "  I 
came  to  bring  you  the  letter.  If  you  like  I  will 
bid  you  good  morning." 

"  Not  yet,  not  yet.  King  the  bell ;  I  want  missy 
to  come." 

It  was  a  servant  who  came  in  answer  to  the  bell. 

"  Tell  missy  to  come ! "  said  Mr.  Featherstone, 
impatiently.  "  What  business  had  she  to  go 
away  ? "  He  spoke  in  the  same  tone  when  Mary 
caiue. 


i8o  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  Why  could  n't  you  sit  still  here  till  I  told  you 
to  go  ?  I  want  my  waistcoat  now.  I  told  you 
always  to  put  it  on  the  bed." 

Mary's  eyes  looked  rather  red,  as  if  she  had  been 
crying.  It  was  clear  that  Mr.  Featherstoue  was  in 
one  of  his  most  snappish  humours  this  morning, 
and  though  Fred  had  now  the  prospect  of  receiving 
the  much-needed  present  of  money,  he  would  have 
preferred  being  free  to  turn  round  on  the  old  tyrant 
and  tell  him  that  Mary  Garth  was  too  good  to  be 
at  his  beck.  Though  Fred  had  risen  as  she  entered 
the  room,  she  had  barely  noticed  him,  and  looked  as 
if  her  nerves  were  quivering  with  the  expectation 
that  something  would  be  thrown  at  her.  But  she 
never  had  anything  worse  than  words  to  dread. 
When  she  went  to  reach  the  waistcoat  from  a  peg, 
Fred  went  up  to  her  and  said,  "  Allow  me." 

"  Let  it  alone  !  You  bring  it,  missy,  and  lay  it 
down  here,"  said  Mr.  Featherstone.  "  Now  you  go 
away  again  till  I  call  you,"  he  added,  when  the 
waistcoat  was  laid  down  by  him.  It  was  usual 
with  him  to  season  his  pleasure  in  showing  favour 
to  one  person  by  being  especially  disagreeable  to 
another,  and  Mary  was  always  at  hand  to  furnish 
the  condiment.  When  his  own  relatives  came  she 
was  treated  better.  Slowly  he  took  out  a  bunch  of 
keys  from  the  waistcoat  pocket,  and  slowly  he  drew 
forth  a  tin  box  which  was  under  the  bed-clothes. 

"  You  expect  I  am  going  to  give  you  a  little  for- 
tune, eh  ? "  he  said,  looking  above  his  spectacles  and 
pausing  in  the  act  of  opening  the  lid. 

"  Not  at  all,  sir.  You  were  good  enough  to  speak 
of  making  me  a  present  the  other  day,  else,  of 
course,  I  should  not  have  thought  of  the  matter." 
But  Fred  was  of  a  hopeful  disposition,  and  a  vision 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  181 

had  presented  itself  of  a  sum  just  large  enough  to 
deliver  him  from  a  certain  anxiety.  When  Fred 
got  into  debt,  it  always  seemed  to  him  highly  pro- 
bable that  something  or  other  —  he  did  not  neces- 
sarily conceive  what  —  would  come  to  pass  enabling 
him  to  pay  in  due  time.  And  now  that  the  provi- 
dential occurrence  was  apparently  close  at  hand,  it 
would  have  been  sheer  absurdity  to  think  that  the 
supply  would  be  short  of  the  need :  as  absurd  as  a 
faith  that  believed  in  half  a  miracle  for  want  of 
strength  to  believe  in  a  whole  one. 

The  deep-veined  hands  fingered  many  bank-notes 
one  after  the  other,  laying  them  down  flat  again, 
while  Fred  leaned  back  in  his  chair,  scorning  to 
look  eager.  He  held  himself  to  be  a  gentleman  at 
heart,  and  did  not  like  courting  an  old  fellow  for  his 
money.  At  last,  Mr.  Featherstone  eyed  him  again 
over  his  spectacles,  and  presented  him  with  a  little 
sheaf  of  notes :  Fred  could  see  distinctly  that  there 
were  but  five,  as  the  less  significant  edges  gaped 
towards  him.  But  then,  each  might  mean  fifty 
pounds.  He  took  them,  saying,  — 

"  I  am  very  much  obliged  to  you,  sir,"  and  was 
going  to  roll  them  up  without  seeming  to  think  of 
their  value.  But  this  did  not  suit  Mr.  Featherstone, 
who  was  eying  him  intently. 

"  Come,  don't  you  think  it  worth  your  while  to 
count  'em  ?  You  take  money  like  a  lord  ;  I  suppose 
you  lose  it  like  one." 

"  I  thought  I  was  not  to  look  a  gift-horse  in  the 
mouth,  sir.  But  I  shall  be  very  happy  to  count 
them." 

Fred  was  not  so  happy,  however,  after  he  had 
counted  them.  For  they  actually  presented  the 
absurdity  of  being  less  than  his  hopefulness  had 


182  MIDDLEMARCH. 

decided  that  they  must  be.  What  can  the  fitness 
of  things  mean,  if  not  their  fitness  to  a  man's 
expectations  ?  Failing  this,  absurdity  and  atheism 
gape  behind  him.  The  collapse  for  Fred  was  severe 
when  he  found  that  he  held  no  more  than  five 
twenties,  and  his  share  in  the  higher  education  of 
this  country  did  not  seem  to  help  him.  Neverthe- 
less he  said,  with  rapid  changes  in  his  fair 
complexion,  — 

"  It  is  very  handsome  of  you,  sir." 

"  I  should  think  it  is,"  said  Mr.  Featherstone, 
locking  his  box  and  replacing  it,  then  taking  off  his 
spectacles  deliberately,  and  at  length,  as  if  his 
inward  meditation  had  more  deeply  convinced  him, 
repeating,  "  I  should  think  it  is  handsome." 

"  I  assure  you,  sir,  I  am  very  grateful,"  said 
Fred,  who  had  had  time  to  recover  his  cheerful  air. 

"  So  you  ought  to  be.  You  want  to  cut  a  figure 
in  the  world,  and  I  reckon  Peter  Featherstone  is 
the  only  one  you  've  got  to  trust  to."  Here  the  old 
man's  eyes  gleamed  with  a  curiously  mingled  satis- 
faction in  the  consciousness  that  this  smart  young 
fellow  relied  upon  him,  and  that  the  smart  young 
fellow  was  rather  a  fool  for  doing  so. 

"  Yes,  indeed  :  I  was  not  born  to  very  splendid 
chances.  Few  men  have  been  more  cramped  than 
I  have  been,"  said  Fred,  with  some  sense  of  surprise 
at  his  own  virtue,  considering  how  hardly  he  was 
dealt  with.  "It  really  seems  a  little  too  bad  to 
have  to  ride  a  broken-winded  hunter,  and  see  men, 
who  are  not  half  such  good  judges  as  yourself,  able 
to  throw  away  any  amount  of  money  on  buying  bad 
bargains." 

"  Well,  you  can  buy  yourself  a  fine  hunter  now. 
Eighty  pound  is  enough  for  that,  I  reckon,  —  and 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  183 

you  '11  have  twenty  pound  over  to  get  yourself  out 
of  any  little  scrape,"  said  Mr.  Featherstone,  chuck- 
ling slightly. 

"  You  are  very  good,  sir,"  said  Fred,  with  a  fine 
sense  of  contrast  between  the  words  and  his  feeling. 

"  Ay,  rather  a  better  uncle  than  your  fine  uncle 
Bulstrode.  You  won't  get  much  out  of  his  spekila- 
tions,  I  think.  He 's  got  a  pretty  strong  string 
round  your  father's  leg,  by  what  I  hear,  eh  ? " 

"  My  father  never  tells  me  anything  about  his 
affairs,  sir." 

"  Well,  he  shows  some  sense  there.  But  other 
people  find  'em  out  without  his  telling.  He  'II  never 
have  much  to  leave  you :  he  '11  most-like  die  with- 
out a  will,  —  he  's  the  sort  of  man  to  do  it,  —  let  'em 
make  him  mayor  of  Middlemarch  as  much  as  they 
like.  But  you  won't  get  much  by  his  dying  with- 
out a  will,  though  you  are  the  eldest  son." 

Fred  thought  that  Mr.  Featherstone  had  never 
been  so  disagreeable  before.  True,  he  had  never 
before  given  him  quite  so  much  money  at  once. 

"  Shall  I  destroy  this  letter  of  Mr.  Bulstrode's, 
sir  ? "  said  Fred,  rising  with  the  letter  as  if  he 
would  put  it  in  the  fire. 

"  Ay,  ay,  I  don't  want  it.  It 's  worth  no  money 
to  me." 

Fred  carried  the  letter  to  the  fire,  and  thrust  the 
poker  through  it  with  much  zest.  He  longed  to  get 
out  of  the  room,  but  he  was  a  little  ashamed  before 
his  inner  self,  as  well  as  before  his  uncle,  to  run  away 
immediately  after  pocketing  the  money.  Presently, 
the  farm-bailiff  came  up  to  give  his  master  a  report, 
and  Fred,  to  his  unspeakable  relief,  was  dismissed 
with  the  injunction  to  come  again  soon. 

He  had  longed  not  only  to  be  set  free  from  his 


1 84  MIDDLEMARCH. 

uncle,  but  also  to  find  Mary  Garth.  She  was  now  in 
her  usual  place  by  the  fire,  with  sewing  in  her 
hands  and  a  book  open  on  the  little  table  by  her 
side.  Her  eyelids  had  lost  some  of  their  redness 
now,  and  she  had  her  usual  air  of  self-command. 

"  Am  I  wanted  upstairs  ? "  she  said,  half  rising 
as  Fred  entered. 

"  No ;  I  am  only  dismissed,  because  Simmons  is 
gone  up." 

Mary  sat  down  again,  and  resumed  her  work. 
She  was  certainly  treating  him  with  more  indiffer- 
ence than  usual ;  she  did  not  know  how  affection- 
ately indignant  he  had  felt  on  her  behalf  upstairs. 

"  May  I  stay  here  a  little,  Mary,  or  shall  I  bore 
you?" 

"  Pray  sit  down,"  said  Mary  ;  "  you  will  not  be  so 
heavy  a  bore  as  Mr.  John  Waule,  who  was  here 
yesterday,  and  he  sat  down  without  asking  my 
leave." 

"  Poor  fellow !  I  think  he  is  in  love  with  you." 

"  I  am  not  aware  of  it.  And  to  me  it  is  one  of 
the  most  odious  things  in  a  girl's  life,  that  there 
must  always  be  some  supposition  of  falling  in  love 
coming  between  her  and  any  man  who  is  kind  to 
her,  and  to  whom  she  is  grateful.  I  should  have 
thought  that  I,  at  least,  might  have  been  safe  from 
all  that.  I  have  no  ground  for  the  nonsensical  van- 
ity of  fancying  everybody  who  comes  near  me  is  in 
love  with  me." 

Mary  did  not  mean  to  betray  any  feeling,  but  in 
spite  of  herself  she  ended  in  a  tremulous  tone  of 
vexation. 

"  Confound  John  Waule !  I  did  not  mean  to  make 
you  angry.  I  did  n't  know  you  had  any  reason  for 
being  grateful  to  me.  I  forgot  what  a  great  ser- 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  185 

vice  you  think  it  if  any  one  snuffs  a  candle  for 
you."  Fred  also  had  his  pride,  and  was  not  go- 
ing to  show  that  he  knew  what  had  called  forth 
this  outburst  of  Mary's. 

"  Oh,  I  am  not  angry,  except  with  the  ways  of 
the  world.  I  do  like  to  be  spoken  to  as  if  I  had 
common-sense.  I  really  often  feel  as  if  I  could 
understand  a  little  more  than  I  ever  hear  even  from 
young  gentlemen  who  have  been  to  college."  Mary 
had  recovered,  and  she  spoke  with  a  suppressed 
rippling  undercurrent  of  laughter  pleasant  to  hear. 

"  I  don't  care  how  merry  you  are  at  my  expense 
this  morning,"  said  Fred,  "  I  thought  you  looked  so 
sad  when  you  came  upstairs.  It  is  a  shame  you 
should  stay  here  to  be  bullied  in  that  way." 

"  Oh,  I  have  an  easy  life  —  by  comparison.  I 
have  tried  being  a  teacher,  and  I  am  not  fit  for 
that :  my  mind  is  too  fond  of  wandering  on  its  own 
way.  I  think  any  hardship  is  better  than  pretend- 
ing to  do  what  one  is  paid  for,  and  never  really  do- 
ing it.  Everything  here  I  can  do  as  well  as  any  one 
else  could ;  perhaps  better  than  some,  —  Rosy,  for 
example.  Though  she  is  just  the  sort  of  beautiful 
creature  that  is  imprisoned  with  ogres  in  fairy 
tales." 

"  Eosy  !  "  cried  Fred,  in  a  tone  of  profound  broth- 
erly scepticism. 

"  Come,  Fred  ! "  said  Mary,  emphatically  ;  "  you 
have  no  right  to  be  so  critical." 

"  Do  you  mean  anything  particular  —  just  now  ? " 

"  No,  I  mean  something  general,  —  always !  " 

"Oh,  that  I  am  idle  and  extravagant.  Well,  I 
am  not  fit  to  be  a  poor  man.  I  should  not  have 
made  a  bad  fellow  if  I  had  been  rich." 

"  You  would  have  done  your  duty  in  that  state  of 


186  MIDDLEMARCH. 

life  to  which  it  has  not  pleased  God  to  call  you," 
said  Mary,  laughing. 

"  Well,  I  could  n't  do  my  duty  as  a  clergyman 
any  more  than  you  could  do  yours  as  a  governess. 
You  ought  to  have  a  little  fellow-feeling  there, 
Mary." 

"I  never  said  you  ought  to  be  a  clergyman. 
There  are  other  sorts  of  work.  It  seems  to  me  very 
miserable  not  to  resolve  on  some  course  and  act 
accordingly." 

"So  I  could,  if  —  "  Fred  broke  off,  and  stood 
up,  leaning  against  the  mantelpiece. 

"  If  you  were  sure  you  should  not  have  a  fortune  ? " 

"  I  did  not  say  that.  You  want  to  quarrel  with 
me.  It  is  too  bad  of  you  to  be  guided  by  what 
other  people  say  about  me." 

"  How  can  I  want  to  quarrel  with  you  ?  I  should 
be  quarrelling  with  all  my  new  books,"  said  Mary, 
lifting  the  volume  on  the  table.  "  However  naughty 
you  may  be  to  other  people,  you  are  good  to  me." 

"Because  I  like  you  better  than  any  one  else. 
But  I  know  you  despise  me." 

"  Yes,  I  do  —  a  little,"  said  Mary,  nodding,  with 
a  smile. 

"  You  would  admire  a  stupendous  fellow,  who 
would  have  wise  opinions  about  everything." 

"  Yes,  I  should."  Mary  was  sewing  swiftly,  and 
seemed  provokingly  mistress  of  the  situation.  When 
a  conversation  has  taken  a  wrong  turn  for  us,  we 
only  get  farther  and  farther  into  the  swamp  of  awk- 
wardness. This  was  what  Fred  Vincy  felt. 

"  I  suppose  a  woman  is  never  in  love  with  any 
one  she  has  always  known  —  ever  since  she  can  re- 
member ;  as  a  man  often  is.  It  is  always  some  new 
fellow  who  strikes  a  girl." 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  187 

"  Let  me  see,"  said  Mary,  the  corners  of  her  mouth 
curling  archly ;  "  I  must  go  back  on  my  experience. 
There  is  Juliet,  —  she  seems  an  example  of  what 
you  say.  But  then  Ophelia  had  probably  known 
Hamlet  a  long  while  ;  and  Brenda  Troil  —  she  had 
known  Mordaunt  Merton  ever  since  they  were 
children ;  but  then  he  seems  to  have  been  an  esti- 
mable young  man ;  and  Minna  was  still  more  deeply 
in  love  with  Cleveland,  who  was  a  stranger.  Wa- 
verley  was  new  to  Flora  Maclvor  ;  but  then  she  did 
not  fall  in  love  with  him.  And  there  are  Olivia 
and  Sophia  Primrose,  and  Corinne  —  they  may  be 
said  to  have  fallen  in  love  with  new  men.  Alto- 
gether, my  experience  is  rather  mixed." 

Mary  looked  up  with  some  roguishness  at  Fred, 
and  that  look  of  hers  was  very  dear  to  him,  though 
the  eyes  were  nothing  more  than  clear  windows 
where  observation  sat  laughingly.  He  was  cer- 
tainly an  affectionate  fellow,  and  as  he  had  grown 
from  boy  to  man,  he  had  grown  in  love  with  his  old 
playmate,  notwithstanding  that  share  in  the  higher 
education  of  the  country  which  had  exalted  his 
views  of  rank  and  income. 

"  When  a  man  is  not  loved,  it  is  no  use  for  him 
to  say  that  he  could  be  a  better  fellow,  —  could  do 
anything,  —  I  mean,  if  he  were  sure  of  being  loved 
in  return." 

"  Not  of  the  least  use  in  the  world  for  him  to 
say  he  could  be  better.  Might,  could,  would, —  they 
are  contemptible  auxiliaries." 

-  "  I  don't  see  how  a  man  is  to  be  good  for  much 
unless  he  has  some  one  woman  to  love  him 
dearly." 

"  I  think  the  goodness  should  come  before  he 
expects  that." 


iS8  MIUDLEMARCH. 

"You  know  better,  Mary.  Women  don't  love 
men  for  their  goodness." 

"  Perhaps  not.  But  if  they  love  them,  they  never 
think  them  bad." 

"  It  is  hardly  fair  to  say  I  am  bad." 

"  I  said  nothing  at  all  about  you." 

"  I  never  shall  be  good  for  anything,  Mary,  if  you 
will  not  say  that  you  love  me,  —  if  you  will  not 
promise  to  marry  me,  —  I  mean  when  I  am  able  to 
marry." 

"  If  I  did  love  you,  I  would  not  marry  you :  I 
would  certainly  not  promise  ever  to  marry  you." 

"  I  think  that  is  quite  wicked,  Mary.  If  you  love 
me,  you  ought  to  promise  to  marry  me." 

"  On  the  contrary,  I  think  it  would  be  wicked  in 
me  to  marry  you  even  if  I  did  love  you." 

"  You  mean,  just  as  I  am,  without  any  means  of 
maintaining  a  wife.  Of  course :  I  am  but  three- 
and-twenty." 

"  In  that  last  point  you  will  alter.  But  I  am  not 
so  sure  of  any  other  alteration.  My  father  says  an 
idle  man  ought  not  to  exist,  much  less  be  married." 

"  Then  I  am  to  blow  my  brains  out  ? " 

"  No ;  on  the  whole  I  should  think  you  would  do 
better  to  pass  your  examination.  I  have  heard  Mr. 
Farebrother  say  it  is  disgracefully  easy." 

"  That  is  all  very  fine.  Anything  is  easy  to  him. 
Not  that  cleverness  has  anything  to  do  with  it.  I 
am  ten  times  cleverer  than  many  men  who  pass." 

"  Dear  me  ! "  said  Mary,  unable  to  repress  her 
sarcasm ;  "  that  accounts  for  the  curates  like  Mr. 
Crowse.  Divide  your  cleverness  by  ten,  and  the 
quotient  —  dear  me  !  —  is  able  to  take  a  degree. 
But  that  only  shows  you  are  ten  times  more  idle 
than  the  others." 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  189 

"  Well,  if  I  did  pasSj  you  would  not  want  me  to 
go  into  the  Church  ?" 

"  That  is  not  the  question,  —  what  I  want  you  to 
do.  You  have  a  conscience  of  your  own,  I  suppose. 
There  !  there  is  Mr.  Lydgate.  I  must  go  and  tell 
my  uncle." 

"  Mary, "  said  Fred,  seizing  her  hand  as  she  rose, 
"  if  you  will  not  give  me  some  encouragement,  I 
shall  get  worse  instead  of  better.  " 

"  I  will  not  give  you  any  encouragement, "  said 
Mary,  reddening.  "  Your  friends  would  dislike  it, 
and  so  would  mine.  My  father  would  think  it  a 
disgrace  to  me  if  I  accepted  a  man  who  got  into 
debt  and  would  not  work !  " 

Fred  was  stung,  and  released  her  hand.  She 
walked  to  the  door,  but  there  she  turned  and  said : 
"  Fred,  you  have  always  been  so  good,  so  generous 
to  me.  I  am  not  ungrateful.  But  never  speak  to 
me  in  that  way  again. " 

"Very  well, "  said  Fred,  sulkily,  taking  up  his 
hat  and  whip.  His  complexion  showed  patches  of 
pale  pink  and  dead  white.  Like  many  a  plucked 
idle  young  gentleman,  he  was  thoroughly  in  love, 
and  with  a  plain  girl,  who  had  no  money!  But 
having  Mr.  Featherstone's  land  in  the  background, 
and  a  persuasion  that,  let  Mary  say  what  she 
would,  she  really  did  care  for  him,  Fred  was  not 
utterly  in  despair. 

When  he  got  home,  he  gave  four  of  the  twenties 
to  his  mother,  asking  her  to  keep  them  for  him. 
"  I  don't  want  to  spend  that  money,  mother.  I 
want  it  to  pay  a  debt  with.  So  keep  it  safe  away 
from  my  fingers. " 

"  Bless  you,  my  dear, "  said  Mrs.  Vincy.  She 
doted  on  her  eldest  son  and  her  youngest  girl  (a 


190  MIDDLEMARCH. 

child  of  six),  whom  others  thought  her  two  naugh- 
tiest children.  The  mother's  eyes  are  not  always 
deceived  in  their  partiality :  she  at  least  can  best 
judge  who  is  the  tender,  filial-hearted  child.  And 
Fred  was  certainly  very  fond  of  his  mother.  Per- 
haps it  was  his  fondness  for  another  person  also 
that  made  him  particularly  anxious  to  take  some 
security  against  his  own  liability  to  spend  the 
hundred  pounds.  For  the  creditor  to  whom  he 
owed  a  hundred  and  sixty  held  a  firmer  security  in 
the  shape  of  a  bill  signed  by  Mary's  father. 


CHAPTER  XV. 

"  Black  eyes  you  have  left,  you  say, 

Blue  eyes  fail  to  draw  you ; 
Yet  you  seem  more  rapt  to-day 
Than  of  old  we  saw  you. 

"  Oh,  I  track  the  fairest  fair 

Through  new  haunts  of  pleasure ; 
Footprints  here  and  echoes  there 
Guide  me  to  my  treasure  : 

"  Lo !   she  turns  —  immortal  youth 

Wrought  to  mortal  stature, 
Fresh  as  starlight's  aged  truth,  — 
Many-named  Nature ! " 

A  GREAT  historian,  as  he  insisted  on  calling  him- 
self, who  had  the  happiness  to  be  dead  a  hundred 
and  twenty  years  ago,  and  so  to  take  his  place 
among  the  colossi  whose  huge  legs  our  living  petti- 
ness is  observed  to  walk  under,  glories  in  his  copi- 
ous remarks  and  digressions  as  the  least  imitable 
part  of  his  work,  and  especially  in  those  initial 
chapters  to  the  successive  books  of  his  history, 
where  he  seems  to  bring  his  arm-chair  to  the  pro- 
scenium and  chat  with  us  in  all  the  lusty  ease  of 
his  fine  English.  But  Fielding  lived  when  the 
days  were  longer  (for  time,  like  money,  is  meas- 
ured by  our  needs),  when  summer  afternoons  were 
spacious,  and  the  clock  ticked  slowly  in  the  winter 
evenings.  We  belated  historians  must  not  linger 
after  his  example ;  and  if  we  did  so,  it  is  probable 
that  our  chat  would  be  thin  and  eager,  as  if  deliv- 
ered from  a  camp-stool  in  a  parrot-house.  I  at 


r92  MTDDLEMARCIL 

least  have  so  much  to  do  in  unravelling  certain 
human  lots,  and  seeing  how  they  were  woven  and 
interwoven,  that  all  the  light  I  can  command  must 
be  concentrated  on  this  particular  web,  and  not 
dispersed  over  that  tempting  range  of  relevancies 
called  the  universe. 

At  present  I  have  to  make  the  new  settler  Lyd- 
gate  better  known  to  any  one  interested  in  him 
than  he  could  possibly  be  even  to  those  who  had 
seen  the  most  of  him  since  his  arrival  in  Middle- 
march.  For  surely  all  must  admit  that  a  man 
may  be  puffed  and  belauded,  envied,  ridiculed, 
counted  upon  as  a  tool  and  fallen  in  love  with,  or 
at  least  selected  as  a  future  husband,  and  yet  re- 
main virtually  unknown,  —  known  merely  as  a 
cluster  of  signs  for  his  neighbours'  false  supposi- 
tions. There  was  a  general  impression,  however, 
that  Lydgate  was  not  altogether  a  common  country 
doctor,  and  in  Middlemarch  at  that  time  such  an 
impression  was  significant  of  great  tilings  being 
expected  from  him.  For  everybody's  family  doctor 
was  remarkably  clever,  and  was  understood  to  have 
immeasurable  skill  in  the  management  and  train- 
ing of  the  most  skittish  or  vicious  diseases.  The 
evidence  of  his  cleverness  was  of  the  higher  intui- 
tive order,  lying  in  his  lady-patients'  immovable 
conviction,  and  was  unassailable  by  any  objection 
except  that  their  intuitions  were  opposed  by  others 
equally  strong ;  each  lady  who  saw  medical  truth 
in  Wrench  and  "  the  strengthening  treatment  "  re- 
garding Toller  and  "  the  lowering  system  "  as  medi- 
cal perdition.  For  the  heroic  times  of  copious 
bleeding  and  blistering  had  not  yet  departed,  still 
less  the  times  of  thorough-going  theory,  when  dis- 
ease in  general  was  called  by  some  bad  name,  and 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  193 

treated  accordingly  without  shilly-shally,  —  as  if, 
for  example,  it  were  to  be  called  insurrection, 
which  must  not  be  fired  on  with  blank-cartridge, 
but  have  its  blood  drawn  at  once.  The  strength  - 
eners  and  the  lowerers  were  all  "  clever  "  men  in 
somebody's  opinion,  which  is  really  as  much  as 
can  be  said  for  any  living  talents.  Nobody's  im- 
agination had  gone  so  far  as  to  conjecture  that  Mr. 
Lydgate  could  know  as  much  as  Dr.  Sprague  and 
Dr.  Miiichin,  the  two  physicians,  who  alone  could 
offer  any  hope  when  danger  was  extreme,  and  when 
the  smallest  hope  was  worth  a  guinea.  Still,  I 
repeat,  there  was  a  general  impression  that  Lydgate 
was  something  rather  more  uncommon  than  any 
general  practitioner  in  Middlemarch.  And  this 
was  true.  He  was  but  seven-and-twenty,  an  age  at 
which  many  men  are  not  quite  common,  —  at 
which  they  are  hopeful  of  achievement,  resolute  in 
avoidance,  thinking  that  Mammon  shall  never  put 
a  bit  in  their  mouths  and  get  astride  their  backs, 
but  rather  that  Mammon,  if  they  have  anything  to 
do  with  him,  shall  draw  their  chariot. 

He  had  been  left  an  orphan  when  he  was  fresh 
from  a  public  school.  His  father,  a  military  man, 
had  made  but  little  provision  for  three  children, 
and  when  the  boy  Tertius  asked  to  have  a  medical 
education,  it  seemed  easier  to  his  guardians  to 
grant  his  request  by  apprenticing  him  to  a  country 
practitioner  than  to  make  any  objections  on  the 
score  of  family  dignity.  He  was  one  of  the  rarer 
lads  who  early  get  a  decided  bent,  and  make  up 
their  minds  that  there  is  something  particular  in 
life  which  they  would  like  to  do  for  its  own  sake, 
and  not  because  their  fathers  did  it.  Most  of  us 
who  turn  to  any  subject  with  love  remember  some 
VOL.  i. — 13 


194  MIDDLEMARCH. 

morning  or  evening  hour  when  we  got  on  a  high 
stool  to  reach  down  an  untried  volume,  or  sat  with 
parted  lips  listening  to  a  new  talker,  or  for  very 
lack  of  books  began  to  listen  to  the  voices  within, 
as  the  first  traceable  beginning  of  our  love.  Some- 
thing of  that  sort  happened  to  Lydgate.  He  was 
a  quick  fellow,  and  when  hot  from  play,  would 
toss  himself  in  a  corner,  and  in  five  minutes  be 
deep  in  any  sort  of  book  that  he  could  lay  his 
hands  on :  if  it  were  Easselas  or  Gulliver,  so  much 
the  better,  but  Bailey's  Dictionary  would  do,  or 
the  Bible  with  the  Apocrypha  in  it.  Something 
he  must  read,  when  he  was  not  riding  the  pony, 
or  running  and  hunting,  or  listening  to  the  talk  of 
men.  All  this  was  true  of  him  at  ten  years  of 
age ;  he  had  then  read  through  "  Chrysal,  or  the 
Adventures  of  a  Guinea,"  which  was  neither  milk 
for  babes,  nor  any  chalky  mixture  meant  to  pass 
for  milk,  and  it  had  already  occurred  to  him  that 
books  were  stuff,  and  that  life  was  stupid.  His 
school  studies  had  not  much  modified  that  opinion, 
for  though  he  "  did  "  his  classics  and  mathematics, 
he  was  not  pre-eminent  in  them.  It  was  said  of 
him  that  Lydgate  could  do  anything  he  liked,  but 
he  had  certainly  not  yet  liked  to  do  anything  re- 
markable. He  was  a  vigorous  animal  with  a  ready 
understanding,  but  no  spark  had  yet  kindled  in 
him  an  intellectual  passion ;  knowledge  seemed  to 
him  a  very  superficial  affair,  easily  mastered : 
judging  from  the  conversation  of  his  elders,  he 
had  apparently  got  already  more  than  was  neces- 
sary for  mature  life.  Probably  this  was  not  an 
exceptional  result  of  expensive  teaching  at  that 
period  of  short-waisted  coats,  and  other  fashions 
which  have  not  yet  recurred.  But,  one  vacation, 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  195 

a  wet  day  sent  him  to  the  small  home  library  to 
hunt  once  more  for  a  book  which  might  have  some 
freshness  for  him :  in  vain !  unless,  indeed,  he 
took  down  a  dusty  row  of  volumes  with  gray-paper 
backs  and  dingy  labels,  —  the  volumes  of  an  old 
Cyclopaedia  which  he  had  never  disturbed.  It 
would  at  least  be  a  novelty  to  disturb  them.  They 
were  on  the  highest  shelf,  and  he  stood  on  a  chair 
to  get  them  down.  But  he  opened  the  volume 
which  he  first  took  from  the  shelf :  somehow,  one 
is  apt  to  read  in  a  makeshift  attitude,  just  where 
it  might  seem  inconvenient  to  do  so.  The  page 
he  opened  on  was  under  the  head  of  Anatomy,  and 
the  first  passage  that  drew  his  eyes  was  on  the 
valves  of  the  heart.  He  was  not  much  acquainted 
with  valves  of  any  sort,  but  he  knew  that  valvce 
were  folding-doors,  and  through  this  crevice  came 
a  sudden  light  startling  him  with  his  first  vivid 
notion  of  finely  adjusted  mechanism  in  the  human 
frame.  A  liberal  education  had  of  course  left  him 
free  to  read  the  indecent  passages  in  the  school 
classics,  but  beyond  a  general  sense  of  secrecy  and 
obscenity  in  connection  with  his  internal  struc- 
ture, had  left  his  imagination  quite  unbiassed,  so 
that  for  anything  he  knew  his  brains  lay  in  small 
bags  at  his  temples,  and  he  had  no  more  thought 
of  representing  to  himself  how  his  blood  circulated 
than  how  paper  served  instead  of  gold.  But  the 
moment  of  vocation  had  come,  and  before  he  got 
down  from  his  chair,  the  world  was  made  new  to 
him  by  a  presentiment  of  endless  processes  filling 
the  vast  spaces  planked  out  of  his  sight  by  that 
wordy  ignorance  which  he  had  supposed  to  be 
knowledge.  From  that  hour  Lydgate  felt  the 
growth  of  an  intellectual  passion. 


196  MIDDLEMARCH. 

We  are  not  afraid  of  telling  over  and  over  again 
how  a  man  comes  to  fall  in  love  with  a  woman 
and  be  wedded  to  her,  or  else  be  fatally  parted 
from  her.  Is  it  due  to  excess  of  poetry  or  of  stu- 
pidity that  we  are  never  weary  of  describing  what 
King  James  called  a  woman's  "  makdom  and  her 
fairnesse, "  never  weary  of  listening  to  the  twang- 
ing of  the  old  Troubadour  strings,  and  are  compara- 
tively uninterested  in  that  other  kind  of  "  makdom 
and  fairnesse  "  which  must  be  wooed  with  indus- 
trious thought  and  patient  renunciation  of  small 
desires  ?  In  the  story  of  this  passion,  too,  the 
development  varies :  sometimes  it  is  the  glorious 
marriage,  sometimes  frustration  and  final  parting. 
And  not  seldom  the  catastrophe  is  bound  up  with 
the  other  passion,  sung  by  the  Troubadours.  For 
in  the  multitude  of  middle-aged  men  who  go  about 
their  vocations  in  a  .daily  course  determined  for 
them  much  in  the  same  way  as  the  tie  of  their 
cravats,  there  is  always  a  good  number  who  once 
meant  to  shape  their  own  deeds  and  alter  the 
world  a  little.  The  story  of  their  coming  to  be 
shapen  after  the  average  and  fit  to  be  packed  by 
the  gross,  is  hardly  ever  told  even  in  their  con- 
sciousness ;  for  perhaps  their  ardour  in  generous 
unpaid  toil  cooled  as  imperceptibly  as  the  ardour 
of  other  youthful  loves,  till  one  day  their  earlier 
self  walked  like  a  ghost  in  its  old  home  and  made 
the  new  furniture  ghastly.  Nothing  in  the  world 
more  subtle  than  the  process  of  their  gradual 
change !  In  the  beginning  they  inhaled  it  un- 
knowingly :  you  and  I  may  have  sent  some  of  our 
breath  towards  infecting  them,  when  we  uttered 
our  conforming  falsities  or  drew  our  silly  conclu- 
sions :  or  perhaps  it  came  with  the  vibrations  from 
a  woman's  glance. 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  197 

Lydgate  did  not  mean  to  be  one  of  those  failures, 
and  there  was  the  better  hope  of  him  because  his 
scientific  interest  soon  took  the  form  of  a  profes- 
sional enthusiasm  :  he  had  a  youthful  belief  in  his 
bread-winning  work,  not  to  be  stifled  by  that  initi- 
ation in  makeshift  called  his  'prentice  days;  and 
he  carried  to  his  studies  in  London,  Edinburgh, 
and  Paris  the  conviction  that  the  medical  profes- 
sion as  it  might  be  was  the  finest  in  the  world; 
presenting  the  most  perfect  interchange  between 
science  and  art ;  offering  the  most  direct  alliance 
between  intellectual  conquest  and  the  social  good. 
Lydgate 's  nature  demanded  this  combination:  he 
was  an  emotional  creature,  with  a  flesh-and-blood 
sense  of  fellowship  which  withstood  all  the  ab- 
stractions of  special  study.  He  cared  not  only 
for  "  cases, "  but  for  John  and  Elizabeth,  especially 
Elizabeth. 

There  was  another  attraction  in  his  profession : 
it  wanted  reform,  and  gave  a  man  an  opportunity 
for  some  indignant  resolve  to  reject  its  venal  deco- 
rations arid  other  humbug,  and  to  be  the  possessor 
of  genuine  though  undemanded  qualifications.  He 
went  to  study  in  Paris  with  the  determination  that 
when  he  came  home  again  he  would  settle  in  some 
provincial  town  as  a  general  practitioner,  and 
resist  the  irrational  severance  between  medical  and 
surgical  knowledge  in  the  interest  of  his  own 
scientific  pursuits,  as  well  as  of  the  general  ad- 
vance :  he  would  keep  away  from  the  range  of 
London  intrigues,  jealousies,  and  social  truckling, 
and  win  celebrity,  however  slowly,  as  Jenner  had 
done,  by  the  independent  value  of  his  work.  For 
it  must  be  remembered  that  this  was  a  dark  period  ; 
and  in  spite  of  venerable  colleges  which  used  great 


198  MIDDLEMAKCH. 

efforts  to  secure  purity  of  knowledge  by  making  it 
scarce,  and  to  exclude  error  by  a  rigid  exclusive- 
ness  in  relation  to  fees  and  appointments,  it  hap- 
pened that  very  ignorant  young  gentlemen  were 
promoted  in  town,  and  many  more  got  a  legal  right 
to  practise  over  large  areas  in  the  country.  Also, 
the  high  standard  held  up  to  the  public  mind  by 
the  College  of  Physicians,  which  gave  its  peculiar 
sanction  to  the  expensive  and  highly  rarefied  medi- 
cal instruction  obtained  by  graduates  of  Oxford 
and  Cambridge,  did  not  hinder  quackery  from  hav- 
ing an  excellent  time  of  it ;  for  since  professional 
practice  chiefly  consisted  in  giving  a  great  many 
drugs,  the  public  inferred  that  it  might  be  better 
off  with  more  drugs  still,  if  they  could  only  be  got 
cheaply,  and  hence  swallowed  large  cubic  measures 
of  physic  prescribed  by  unscrupulous  ignorance 
which  had  taken  no  degrees.  Considering  that 
statistics  had  not  yet  embraced  a  calculation  as  to 
the  number  of  ignorant  or  canting  doctors  which 
absolutely  must  exist  in  the  teeth  of  all  changes,  it 
seemed  to  Lydgate  that  a  change  in  the  units  was 
the  most  direct  mode  of  changing  the  numbers.  He 
meant  to  be  a  unit  who  would  make  a  certain  amount 
of  difference  towards  that  spreading  change  which 
would  one  day  tell  appreciably  upon  the  averages, 
and  in  the  mean  time  have  the  pleasure  of  making 
an  advantageous  difference  to  the  viscera  of  his 
own  patients.  But  he  did  not  simply  aim  at  a 
more  genuine  kind  of  practice  than  was  common. 
He  was  ambitious  of  a  wider  effect :  he  was  fired 
with  the  possibility  that  he  might  work  out  the 
proof  of  an  anatomical  conception,  and  make  a  link 
in  the  chain  of  discovery. 

Does  it  seem  incongruous  to  you  that  a  Middle- 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  199 

inarch  surgeon  should  dream  of  himself  as  a  dis- 
coverer? Most  of  us,  indeed,  know  little  of  the 
great  originators  until  they  have  been  lifted  up 
among  the  constellations  and  already  rule  our  fates. 
But  that  Herschel,  for  example,  who  "  broke  the 
barriers  of  the  heavens, "  —  did  he  not  once  play 
a  provincial  church-organ,  and  give  music-lessons 
to  stumbling  pianists  ?  Each  of  those  Shining 
Ones  had  to  walk  on  the  earth  among  neighbours 
who  perhaps  thought  much  more  of  his  gait  and 
his  garments  than  of  anything  which  was  to  give 
him  a  title  to  everlasting  fame :  each  of  them  had 
his  little  local  personal  history  sprinkled  with 
small  temptations  and  sordid  cares,  which  made 
the  retarding  friction  of  his  course  towards  final 
companionship  with  the  immortals.  Lydgate  was 
not  blind  to  the  dangers  of  such  friction,  but  he 
had  plenty  of  confidence  in  his  resolution  to  avoid 
it  as  far  as  possible :  being  seven-and-twenty,  he 
felt  himself  experienced.  And  he  was  not  going 
to  have  his  vanities  provoked  by  contact  with  the 
showy  worldly  successes  of  the  capital,  but  to  live 
among  people  who  could  hold  no  rivalry  with  that 
pursuit  of  a  great  idea  which  was  to  be  a  twin 
object  with  the  assiduous  practice  of  his  profes- 
sion. There  was  fascination  in  the  hope  that  the 
two  purposes  would  illuminate  each  other:  the 
careful  observation  and  inference  which  was  his 
daily  work,  the  use  of  the  lens  to  further  his  judg- 
ment in  special  cases,  would  further  his  thought 
as  an  instrument  of  larger  inquiry.  Was  not  this 
the  typical  pre-eminence  of  his  profession  ?  He 
would  be  a  good  Middlemarch  doctor,  and  by  that 
very  means  keep  himself  in  the  track  of  far-reach- 
ing investigation.  On  one  point  he  may  fairly 


200  MIDDLEMAUCIL 

claim  approval  at  this  particular  stage  of  his 
career :  he  did  not  mean  to  imitate  those  philan- 
thropic models  who  make  a  profit  out  of  poisonous 
pickles  to  support  themselves  while  they  are  ex- 
posing adulteration,  or  hold  shares  in  a  gambling- 
hell  that  they  may  have  leisure  to  represent  the 
cause  of  public  morality.  He  intended  to  begin  in 
his  own  case  some  particular  reforms  which  were 
quite  certainly  within  his  reach,  and  much  less  of 
a  problem  than  the  demonstrating  of  an  anatomi- 
cal conception.  One  of  these  reforms  was  to  act 
stoutly  on  the  strength  of  a  recent  legal  decision, 
and  simply  prescribe,  without  dispensing  drugs  or 
taking  percentage  from  druggists.  This  was  an 
innovation  for  one  who  had  chosen  to  adopt  the 
style  of  general  practitioner  in  a  country  town, 
and  would  be  felt  as  offensive  criticism  by  his 
professional  brethren.  But  Lydgate  meant  to  in- 
novate in  his  treatment  also,  and  he  was  wise 
enough  to  see  that  the  best  security  for  his  prac- 
tising honestly  according  to  his  belief  was  to  get 
rid  of  systematic  temptations  to  the  contrary. 

Perhaps  that  was  a  more  cheerful  time  for  ob- 
servers and  theorizers  than  the  present ;  we  are  apt 
to  think  it  the  finest  era  of  the  world  when  Amer- 
ica was  beginning  to  be  discovered,  when  a  bold 
sailor,  even  if  he  were  wrecked,  might  alight  on  a 
new  kingdom ;  and  about  1829  the  dark  territories 
of  Pathology  were  a  fine  America  for  a  spirited 
young  adventurer.  Lydgate  was  ambitious  above 
all  to  contribute  towards  enlarging  the  scientific, 
rational  basis  of  his  profession.  The  more  he  be- 
came interested  in  special  questions  of  disease, 
such  as  the  nature  of  fever  or  fevers,  the  more 
keenly  he  felt  the  need  for  that  fundamental 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  201 

knowledge  of  structure  which  just  at  the  begin- 
ning of  the  century  had  been  illuminated  by  the 
brief  and  glorious  career  of  Bichat,  who  died  when 
he  was  only  one-and-tbirty,  but,  like  another 
Alexander,  left  a  realm  large  enough  for  many 
heirs.  That  great  Frenchman  first  carried  out  the 
conception  that  living  bodies,  fundamentally  con- 
sidered, are  not  associations  of  organs  which  can 
be  understood  by  studying  them  first  apart,  and 
then  as  it  were  federally ;  but  must  be  regarded  as 
consisting  of  certain  primary  webs  or  tissues,  out 
of  which  the  various  organs  —  brain,  heart,  lungs, 
and  so  on  —  are  compacted,  as  the  various  accom  - 
modations  of  a  house  are  built  up  in  various  pro- 
portions of  wood,  iron,  stone,  brick,  zinc,  and  the 
rest,  each  material  having  its  peculiar  composition 
and  proportions.  No  man,  one  sees,  can  under- 
stand and  estimate  the  entire  structure  or  its  parts 
—  what  are  its  frailties  and  what  its  repairs  — 
without  knowing  the  nature  of  the  materials.  And 
the  conception  wrought  out  by  Bichat,  with  his 
detailed  study  of  the  different  tissues,  acted  neces- 
sarily on  medical  questions  as  the  turning  of  gas- 
light would  act  on  a  dim,  oil-lit  street,  showing 
new  connections  and  hitherto  hidden  facts  of 
structure  which  must  be  taken  into  account  in 
considering  the  symptoms  of  maladies  and  the 
action  of  medicaments.  But  results  which  depend 
on  human  conscience  and  intelligence  work  slowly, 
and  now,  at  the  end  of  1829,  most  medical  practice 
was  still  strutting  or  shambling  along  the  old 
paths,  and  there  was  still  scientific  work  to  be 
done  which  might  have  seemed  to  be  a  direct 
sequence  of  Bichat's.  This  great  seer  did  not  go 
beyond  the  consideration  of  the  tissues  as  ultimate 


202  MIDDLEMARCH. 

facts  in  the  living  organism,  marking  the  limit  of 
anatomical  analysis ;  but  it  was  open  to  another 
mind  to  say,  have  not  these  structures  some  com- 
mon basis  from  which  they  have  all  started,  as 
your  sarsenet,  gauze,  net,  satin,  and  velvet  from 
the  raw  cocoon  ?  Here  would  be  another  light,  as 
of  oxyhydrogen,  showing  the  very  grain  of  things, 
and  revising  all  former  explanations.  Of  this 
sequence  to  Bichat's  work,  already  vibrating  along 
many  currents  of  the  European  mind,  Lydgate  was 
enamoured;  he  longed  to  demonstrate  the  more 
intimate  relations  of  living  structure,  and  help  to 
define  men's  thought  more  accurately  after  the 
true  order.  The  work  had  not  yet  been  done,  but 
only  prepared  for  those  who  knew  how  to  use  the 
preparation.  What  was  the  primitive  tissue  ?  In 
that  way  Lydgate  put  the  question, —  not  quite  in 
the  way  required  by  the  awaiting  answer;  but 
such  missing  of  the  right  word  befalls  many 
seekers.  And  he  counted  on  quiet  intervals  to  be 
watchfully  seized,  for  taking  up  the  threads  of 
investigation,  —  on  many  hints  to  be  won  from 
diligent  application,  not  only  of  the  scalpel,  but 
of  the  microscope,  which  research  had  begun  to 
use  again  with  new  enthusiasm  of  reliance.  Such 
was  Lydgate 's  plan  of  his  future :  to  do  good  small 
work  for  Middlemarch,  and  great  work  for  the 
world. 

He  was  certainly  a  happy  fellow  at  this  time : 
to  be  seven-and-twenty,  without  any  fixed  vices, 
with  a  generous  resolution  that  his  action  should 
be  beneficent,  and  with  ideas  in  his  brain  that  made 
life  interesting  quite  apart  from  the  cultus  of  horse- 
flesh and  other  mystic  rites  of  costly  observance, 
which  the  eight  hundred  pounds  left  him  after 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  203 

buying  his  practice  would  certainly  not  have  gone 
far  in  paying  for.  He  was  at  a  starting-point 
which  makes  many  a  man's  career  a  fine  subject 
for  betting,  if  there  were  any  gentlemen  given  to 
that  amusement  who  could  appreciate  the  compli- 
cated probabilities  of  an  arduous  purpose,  with  all 
the  possible  thwartings  and  furtherings  of  circum- 
stance, all  the  niceties  of  inward  balance,  by  which 
a  man  swims  and  makes  his  point  or  else  is  carried 
headlong.  The  risk  would  remain  even  with  close 
knowledge  of  Lydgate's  character;  for  character 
too  is  a  process  and  an  unfolding.  The  man  was 
still  in  the  making,  as  much  as  the  Middlemarch 
doctor  and  immortal  discoverer,  and  there  were 
both  virtues  and  faults  capable  of  shrinking  or  ex- 
panding. The  faults  will  not,  I  hope,  be  a  reason 
for  the  withdrawal  of  your  interest  in  him.  Among 
our  valued  friends  is  there  not  some  one  or  other 
who  is  a  little  too  self-confident  and  disdainful ; 
whose  distinguished  mind  is  a  little  spotted  with 
commonness ;  who  is  a  little  pinched  here  and 
protuberant  there  with  native  prejudices;  or  whose 
better  energies  are  liable  to  lapse  down  the  wrong 
channel  under  the  influence  of  transient  solicita- 
tions ?  All  these  things  might  be  alleged  against 
Lydgate,  but  then,  they  are  the  periphrases  of  a 
polite  preacher,  who  talks  of  Adam,  and  would 
not  like  to  mention  anything  painful  to  the  pew- 
renters.  The  particular  faults  from  which  these 
delicate  generalities  are  distilled  have  distinguish- 
able physiognomies,  diction,  accent,  and  grimaces ; 
filling  up  parts  in  very  various  dramas.  Our  vani- 
ties differ  as  our  noses  do :  all  conceit  is  not  the 
same  conceit,  but  varies  in  correspondence  with 
the  minutiae  of  mental  make  in  which  one  of  us 


204  MIDDLEMARCH. 

differs  from  another.  Lydgate's  conceit  was  of 
the  arrogant  sort,  never  simpering,  never  imperti- 
nent, but  massive  in  its  claims  and  benevolently 
contemptuous.  He  would  do  a  great  deal  for 
noodles,  being  sorry  for  them,  and  feeling  quite 
sure  that  they  could  have  no  power  over  him :  he 
had  thought  of  joining  the  Saint  Simonians  when 
he  was  in  Paris,  in  order  to  turn  them  against 
some  of  their  own  doctrines.  All  his  faults  were 
marked  by  kindred  traits,  and  were  those  of  a  man 
who  had  a  fine  barytone,  whose  clothes  hung  well 
upon  him,  and  who  even  in  his  ordinary  gestures 
had  an  air  of  inbred  distinction.  Where  then  lay 
the  spots  of  commonness  ?  says  a  young  lady  enam- 
oured of  that  careless  grace.  How  could  there  be 
any  commonness  in  a  man  so  well-bred,  so  ambi- 
tious of  social  distinction,  so  generous  and  unusual 
in  his  views  of  social  duty  ?  As  easily  as  there 
may  be  stupidity  in  a  man  of  genius  if  you  take 
him  unawares  on  the  wrong  subject,  or  as  many  a 
man  who  has  the  best  will  to  advance  the  social 
millennium  might  be  ill-inspired  in  imagining  its 
lighter  pleasures;  unable  to  go  beyond  Offenbach's 
music,  or  the  brilliant  punning  in  the  last  bur- 
lesque. Lydgate's  spots  of  commonness  lay  in  the 
complexion  of  his  prejudices,  which,  in  spite  of 
noble  intention  and  sympathy,  were  half  of  them 
such  as  are  found  in  ordinary  men  of  the  world : 
that  distinction  of  mind  which  belonged  to  his 
intellectual  ardour  did  not  penetrate  his  feeling 
and  judgment  about  furniture,  or  women,  or  the 
desirability  of  its  being  known  (without  his  tell- 
ing) that  he  was  better  born  than  other  country 
surgeons.  He  did  not  mean  to  think  of  furniture 
at  present ;  but  whenever  he  did  so  it  was  to  be 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  205 

feared  that  neither  biology  nor  schemes  of  reform 
would  lift  him  above  the  vulgarity  of  feeling  that 
there  would  be  an  incompatibility  in  his  furniture 
not  being  of  the  best. 

As  to  women,  he  had  once  already  been  drawn 
headlong  by  impetuous  folly,  which  he  meant  to 
be  final,  since  marriage  at  some  distant  period 
would  of  course  not  be  impetuous.  For  those  who 
want  to  be  acquainted  with  Lydgate  it  will  be 
good  to  know  what  was  that  case  of  impetuous 
folly,  for  it  may  stand  as  an  example  of  the  fitful 
swerving  of  passion  to  which  he  was  prone,  to- 
gether with  the  chivalrous  kindness  which  helped 
to  make  him  morally  lovable.  The  story  can  be 
told  without  many  words.  It  happened  when  he 
was  studying  in  Paris,  and  just  at  the  time  when, 
over  and  above  his  other  work,  he  was  occupied 
with  some  galvanic  experiments.  One  evening, 
tired  with  his  experimenting,  and  not  being  able 
to  elicit  the  facts  he  needed,  he  left  his  frogs  and 
rabbits  to  some  repose  under  their  trying  and  mys- 
terious dispensation  of  unexplained  shocks,  and 
went  to  finish  his  evening  at  the  theatre  of  the 
Porte  Saint  Martin,  where  there  was  a  melodrama 
which  he  had  already  seen  several  times ;  attracted, 
not  by  the  ingenious  work  of  the  collaborating 
authors,  but  by  an  actress  whose  part  it  was  to 
stab  her  lover,  mistaking  him  for  the  evil-design- 
ing duke  of  the  piece.  Lydgate  was  in  love  with 
this  actress,  as  a  man  is  in  love  with  a  woman 
whom  he  never  expects  to  speak  to.  She  was  a 
Provencale,  with  dark  eyes,  a  Greek  profile,  and 
rounded  majestic  form,  having  that  sort  of  beauty 
which  carries  a  sweet  matronliness  even  in  youth, 
and  her  voice  was  a  soft  cooing.  She  had  but 


206  MIDDLEMAUCH. 

lately  come  to  Paris,  and  bore  a  virtuous  reputa- 
tion, her  husband  acting  with  her  as  the  unfortu- 
nate lover.  It  was  her  acting  which  was  "  no  better 
than  it  should  be,"  but  the  public  was  satisfied. 
Lydgate's  only  relaxation  now  was  to  go  and  look 
at  this  woman,  just  as  he  might  have  thrown  him- 
self under  the  breath  of  the  sweet  south  on  a  bank 
of  violets  for  a  while,  without  prejudice  to  his 
galvanism,  to  which  he  would  presently  return. 
But  this  evening  the  old  drama  had  a  new  catas- 
trophe. At  the  moment  when  the  heroine  was  to 
act  the  stabbing  of  her  lover,  and  he  was  to  fall 
gracefully,  the  wife  veritably  stabbed  her  husband, 
who  fell  as  death  willed.  A  wild  shriek  pierced 
the  house,  and  the  Provenc^ale  fell  swooning :  a 
shriek  and  a  swoon  were  demanded  by  the  play, 
but  the  swooning  too  was  real  this  time.  Lydgate 
leaped  and  climbed,  he  hardly  knew  how,  on  to 
the  stage,  and  was  active  in  help,  making  the 
acquaintance  of  his  heroine  by  finding  a  contusion 
on  her  head  and  lifting  her  gently  in  his  arms. 
Paris  rang  with  the  story  of  this  death :  was  it  a 
murder?  Some  of  the  actress's  warmest  admirers 
were  inclined  to  believe  in  her  guilt,  and  liked  her 
the  better  for  it  (such  was  the  taste  of  those  times) ; 
but  Lydgate  was  not  one  of  these.  He  vehemently 
contended  for  her  innocence,  and  the  remote  im- 
personal passion  for  her  beauty  which  he  had  felt 
before,  had  passed  now  into  personal  devotion,  and 
tender  thought  of  her  lot.  The  notion  of  murder 
was  absurd  :  no  motive  was  discoverable,  the  young 
couple  being  understood  to  dote  on  each  other ;  and 
it  was  not  unprecedented  that  an  accidental  slip  of 
the  foot  should  have  brought  these  grave  conse- 
quences. The  legal  investigation  ended  in  Ma- 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  207 

dame  Laure 's  release.  Lydgate  by  this  time  had 
had  many  interviews  with  her,  and  found  her 
more  and  more  adorable.  She  talked  little ;  but 
that  was  an  additional  charm.  She  was  melan- 
choly, and  seemed  grateful ;  her  presence  was 
enough,  like  that  of  the  evening  light.  Lydgate 
was  madly  anxious  about  her  affection,  and  jealous 
lest  any  other  man  than  himself  should  win  it  and 
ask  her  to  marry  him.  But  instead  of  reopening  her 
engagement  at  the  Porte  Saint  Martin,  where  she 
would  have  been  all  the  more  popular  for  the  fatal 
episode,  she  left  Paris  without  warning,  forsaking 
her  little  court  of  admirers.  Perhaps  no  one  car- 
ried inquiry  far  except  Lydgate,  who  felt  that  all 
science  had  come  to  a  stand-still  while  he  ima- 
gined the  unhappy  Laure,  stricken  by  ever-wan- 
dering sorrow,  herself  wandering,  and  finding  no 
faithful  comforter.  Hidden  actresses,  however,  are 
not  so  difficult  to  find  as  some  other  hidden  facts, 
and  it  was  not  long  before  Lydgate  gathered  indi- 
cations that  Laure  had  taken  the  route  to  Lyons. 
He  found  her  at  last  acting  with  great  success  at 
Avignon  under  the  same  name,  looking  more  ma- 
jestic than  ever  as  a  forsaken  wife  carrying  her 
child  in  her  arms.  He  spoke  to  her  after  the  play, 
was  received  with  the  usual  quietude,  which  seemed 
to  him  beautiful  as  clear  depths  of  water,  and  ob- 
tained leave  to  visit  her  the  next  day ;  when  he 
was  bent  on  telling  her  that  he  adored  her,  and  on 
asking  her  to  marry  him.  He  knew  that  this  was 
like  the  sudden  impulse  of  a  madman,  —  incongru- 
ous even  with  his  habitual  foibles.  No  matter! 
It  was  the  one  thing  which  he  was  resolved  to  do. 
He  had  two  selves  within  him  apparently,  and 
they  must  learn  to  accommodate  each  other  and 


208  MIDDLEMARCH. 

bear  reciprocal  impediments.  Strange,  that  some 
of  us,  with  quick  alternate  vision,  see  beyond  our 
infatuations,  and  even  while  we  rave  on  the 
heights,  behold  the  wide  plain  where  our  persis- 
tent self  pauses  and  awaits  us. 

To  have  approached  Laure  with  any  suit  that  was 
not  reverentially  tender  would  have  been  simply  a 
contradiction  of  his  whole  feeling  towards  her. 

"  You  have  come  all  the  way  from  Paris  to  find 
me  ?  "  she  said  to  him,  the  next  day,  sitting  before 
him  with  folded  arms,  and  looking  at  him  with 
eyes  that  seemed  to  wonder  as  an  untamed  rumi- 
nating animal  wonders.  "  Are  all  Englishmen  like 
that  ?  " 

"  I  came  because  I  could  not  live  without  trying 
to  see  you.  You  are  lonely ;  I  love  you ;  I  want 
you  to  consent  to  be  my  wife ;  I  will  wait,  but  I 
want  you  to  promise  that  you  will  marry  me,  — 
no  one  else. " 

Laure  looked  at  him  in  silence  with  a  melan- 
choly radiance  from  under  her  grand  eyelids,  until 
he  was  full  of  rapturous  certainty,  and  knelt  close 
to  her  knees. 

"  I  will  tell  you  something, "  she  said,  in  her 
cooing  way,  keeping  her  arms  folded.  "  My  foot 
really  slipped. " 

"  I  know,  I  know, "  said  Lydgate,  deprecatingly. 
"  It  was  a  fatal  accident,  —  a  dreadful  stroke  of 
calamity  that  bound  me  to  you  the  more. " 

Again  Laure  paused  a  little,  and  then  said 
slowly,  "  /  meant  to  do  it. " 

Lydgate,  strong  man  as  he  was,  turned  pale  and 
trembled :  moments  seemed  to  pass  before  he  rose 
and  stood  at  a  distance  from  her. 

"  There  was  a  secret,  then, "  he  said  at  last,  even 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  209 

vehemently.  "  He  was  brutal  to  you :  you  hated 
him. " 

"  No !  he  wearied  me ;  he  was  too  fond :  he 
would  live  in  Paris,  and  not  in  my  country ;  that 
was  not  agreeable  to  me. " 

"  Great  God !  "  said  Lydgate.  in  a  groan  of  hor- 
ror. "  And  you  planned  to  murder  him  ?  " 

"  I  did  not  plan :  it  came  to  me  in  the  play,  — 
/  meant  to  do  it.  " 

Lydgate  stood  mute,  and  unconsciously  pressed 
his  hat  on  while  he  looked  at  her.  He  saw  this 
woman  —  the  first  to  whom  he  had  given  his 
young  adoration  —  amid  the  throng  of  stupid 
criminals. 

"  You  are  a  good  young  man, "  she  said.  "  But 
I  do  not  like  husbands.  I  will  never  have 
another.  " 

Three  days  afterwards  Lydgate  was  at  his  gal- 
vanism again  in  his  Paris  chambers,  believing  that 
illusions  were  at  an  end  for  him.  He  was  saved 
from  hardening  effects  by  the  abundant  kindness 
of  his  heart,  and  his  belief  that  human  life  might 
be  made  better.  But  he  had  more  reason  than 
ever  for  trusting  his  judgment,  now  that  it  was  so 
experienced ;  and  henceforth  he  would  take  a 
strictly  scientific  view  of  woman,  entertaining  no 
expectations  but  such  as  were  justified  beforehand. 

No  one  in  Middlemarch  was  likely  to  have  such 
a  notion  of  Lydgate 's  past  as  has  here  been  faintly 
shadowed,  and  indeed  the  respectable  townsfolk 
there  were  not  more  given  than  mortals  generally 
to  any  eager  attempt  at  exactness  in  the  represen- 
tation to  themselves  of  what  did  not  come  under 
their  own  senses.  Not  only  young  virgins  of  that 
town,  but  gray-bearded  men  also,  were  often  in 

VOL.  I.  —  14 


210  MIDDLEMARCH. 

haste  to  conjecture  how  a  new  acquaintance  might 
be  wrought  into  their  purposes,  contented  with 
very  vague  knowledge  as  to  the  way  in  which  life 
had  been  shaping  him  for  that  instrumentality. 
Middlemarch,  in  fact,  counted  on  swallowing  Lyd- 
gate  and  assimilating  him  very  comfortably. 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

All  that  in  woman  is  adored 

In  thy  fair  self  I  find  — 
For  the  whole  sex  can  but  afford 

The  handsome  and  the  kind. 

SIR  CHARLES  SEDLEY. 

THE  question  whether  Mr.  Tyke  should  be  ap- 
pointed as  salaried  chaplain  to  the  hospital  was  an 
exciting  topic  to  the  Middlemarchers ;  and  Lydgate 
heard  it  discussed  in  a  way  that  threw  much  light 
on  the  power  exercised  in  the  town  by  Mr.  Bul- 
strode.  The  banker  was  evidently  a  ruler,  but 
there  was  an  opposition  party,  and  even  among  his 
supporters  there  were  some  who  allowed  it  to  be 
seen  that  their  support  was  a  compromise,  and 
who  frankly  stated  their  impression  that  the  gen- 
eral scheme  of  things,  and  especially  the  casualties 
of  trade,  required  you  to  hold  a  candle  to  the 
devil. 

Mr.  Bulstrode's  power  was  not  due  simply  to 
his  being  a  country  banker,  who  knew  the  finan- 
cial secrets  of  most  traders  in  the  town  and  could 
touch  the  springs  of  their  credit ;  it  was  fortified 
by  a  beneficence  that  was  at  once  ready  and  severe, 
—  ready  to  confer  obligations,  and  severe  in  watch- 
ing the  result.  He  had  gathered,  as  an  industrious 
man  always  at  his  post,  a  chief  share  in  adminis- 
tering the  town  charities,  and  his  private  charities 
were  both  minute  and  abundant.  He  would  take 
a  great  deal  of  pains  about  apprenticing  Tegg  the 


212  MIBDLEMARCH. 

shoemaker's  son,  and  he  would  watch  over  Tegg's 
church -going;  he  would  defend  Mrs.  Strype  the 
washerwoman  against  Stubbs's  unjust  exaction  on 
the  score  of  her  drying-ground,  and  he  would  him- 
self scrutinize  a  calumny  against  Mrs.  Strype. 
His  private  minor  loans  were  numerous,  but  he 
would  inquire  strictly  into  the  circumstances  both 
before  and  after.  In  this  way  a  man  gathers  a 
domain  in  his  neighbours'  hope  and  fear  as  well 
as  gratitude ;  and  power,  when  once  it  has  got  into 
that  subtle  region,  propagates  itself  spreading  out 
of  all  proportion  to  its  external  means.  It  was 
a  principle  with  Mr.  Bulstrode  to  gain  as  much 
power  as  possible,  that  he  might  use  it  for  the 
glory  of  God.  He  went  through  a  great  deal  of 
spiritual  conflict  and  inward  argument  in  order 
to  adjust  his  motives,  and  make  clear  to  himself 
what  God's  glory  required.  But,  as  we  have  seen, 
his  motives  were  not  always  rightly  appreciated. 
There  were  many  crass  minds  in  Middlemarch 
whose  reflective  scales  could  only  weigh  things  in 
the  lump ;  and  they  had  a  strong  suspicion  that 
since  Mr.  Bulstrode  could  not  enjoy  life  in  their 
fashion,  eating  and  drinking  so  little  as  he  did, 
and  worreting  himself  about  everything,  he  must 
have  a  sort  of  vampire's  feast  in  the  sense  of 
mastery. 

The  subject  of  the  chaplaincy  came  up  at  Mr. 
Vincy's  table  when  Lydgate  was  dining  there,  and 
the  family  connection  with  Mr.  Bulstrode  did  not, 
he  observed,  prevent  some  freedom  of  remark  even 
on  the  part  of  the  host  himself,  though  his  reasons 
against  the  proposed  arrangement  turned  entirely 
on  his  objection  to  Mr.  Tyke's  sermons,  which  were 
all  doctrine,  and  his  preference  for  Mr.  Farebrother, 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  213 

whose  sermons  were  free  from  that  taint.  Mr. 
Vincy  liked  well  enough  the  notion  of  the  chap- 
lain's having  a  salary,  supposing  it  were  given  to 
Farebrother,  who  was  as  good  a  little  fellow  as 
ever  breathed,  and  the  best  preacher  anywhere, 
and  companionable  too. 

"  What  line  shall  you  take,  then  ?  "  said  Mr. 
Chichely,  the  coroner,  a  great  coursing  comrade  of 
Mr.  Vincy 's. 

"  Oh,  I  'm  precious  glad  I  'm  not  one  of  the 
Directors  now.  I  shall  vote  for  referring  the  mat- 
ter to  the  Directors  and  the  Medical  Board  to- 
gether. I  shall  roll  some  of  my  responsibility  on 
your  shoulders,  Doctor,"  said  Mr.  Vincy,  glancing 
first  at  Dr.  Sprague,  the  senior  physician  of  the 
town,  and  then  at  Lydgate,  who  sat  opposite. 
"  You  medical  gentlemen  must  consult  which  sort 
of  black  draught  you  will  prescribe,  eh,  Mr. 
Lydgate?" 

"  I  know  little  of  either, "  said  Lydgate ;  "  but 
in  general,  appointments  are  apt  to  be  made  too 
much  a  question  of  personal  liking.  The  fittest 
man  for  a  particular  post  is  not  always  the  best- 
fellow  or  the  most  agreeable.  Sometimes,  if  you 
wanted  to  get  a  reform,  your  only  way  would  be  to 
pension  off  the  good  fellows  whom  everybody  is 
fond  of,  and  put  them  out  of  the  question. " 

Dr.  Sprague,  who  was  considered  the  physician 
of  most  "  weight, "  though  Dr.  Minchin  was  usu- 
ally said  to  have  more  "  penetration,"  divested  his 
large  heavy  face  of  all  expression,  and  looked  at 
his  wineglass  while  Lydgate  was  speaking.  What- 
ever was  not  problematical  and  suspected  about 
this  young  man  —  for  example,  a  certain  showi- 
ness  as  to  foreign  ideas,  and  a  disposition  to  unset- 


214  MIDDLEMARCH. 

tie  what  had  been  settled  and  forgotten  by  his 
elders  —  was  positively  unwelcome  to  a  physician 
whose  standing  had  been  fixed  thirty  years  before 
by  a  treatise  on  Meningitis,  of  which  at  least  one 
copy  marked  "  own  "  was  bound  in  calf.  For  my 
part  I  have  some  fellow-feeling  with  Dr.  Sprague : 
one's  self-satisfaction  is  an  untaxed  kind  of  prop- 
erty which  it  is  very  unpleasant  to  find  depreciated. 

Lydgate's  remark,  however,  did  not  meet  the 
sense  of  the  company.  Mr.  Vincy  said  that  if  he 
could  have  his  way,  he  would  not  put  disagreeable 
fellows  anywhere. 

"  Hang  your  reforms ! "  said  Mr.  Chichely. 
"  There  's  no  greater  humbug  in  the  world.  You 
never  hear  of  a  reform,  but  it  means  some  trick  to 
put  in  new  men.  I  hope  you  are  not  one  of  the 
'Lancet's'  men,  Mr.  Lydgate, — wanting  to  take 
the  coronership  out  of  the  hands  of  the  legal  pro- 
fession :  your  words  appear  to  point  that  way. " 

"  I  disapprove  of  Wakley, "  interposed  Dr. 
Sprague,  "  no  man  more :  he  is  an  ill-intentioned 
fellow,  who  would  sacrifice  the  respectability  of 
the  profession,  which  everybody  knows  depends 
on  the  London  Colleges,  for  the  sake  of  getting 
some  notoriety  for  himself.  There  are  men  who 
don't  mind  about  being  kicked  blue  if  they  can 
only  get  talked  about.  But  Wakley  is  right  some- 
times, "  the  Doctor  added  judicially.  "  I  could 
mention  one  or  two  points  in  which  Wakley  is  in 
the  right. " 

"  Oh,  well, "  said  Mr.  Chichely,  "  I  blame  no 
man  for  standing  up  in  favour  of  his  own  cloth ; 
but,  coming  to  argument,  I  should  like  to  know 
how  a  coroner  is  to  judge  of  evidence  if  he  has  not 
had  a  legal  training  ?  " 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  215 

"  In  my  opinion, "  said  Lydgate,  "  legal  training 
only  makes  a  man  more  incompetent  in  questions 
that  require  knowledge  of  another  kind.  People 
talk  about  evidence  as  if  it  could  really  be  weighed 
in  scales  by  a  blind  Justice.  No  man  can  judge 
what  is  good  evidence  on  any  particular  subject, 
unless  he  knows  that  subject  well.  A  lawyer  is 
no  better  than  an  old  woman  at  a  post-mortem  ex- 
amination. How  is  he  to  know  the  action  of  a 
poison  ?  You  might  as  well  say  that  scanning 
verse  will  teach  you  to  scan  the  potato  crops. " 

"  You  are  aware,  I  suppose,  that  it  is  not  the 
coroner's  business  to  conduct  the  post-mortem,  but 
only  to  take  the  evidence  of  the  medical  witness  ?" 
said  Mr.  Chichely,  with  some  scorn. 

"  Who  is  often  almost  as  ignorant  as  the  coroner 
himself,"  said  Lydgate.  "Questions  of  medical 
jurisprudence  ought  not  to  be  left  to  the  chance  of 
decent  knowledge  in  a  medical  witness,  and  the 
coroner  ought  not  to  be  a  man  who  will  believe 
that  strychnine  will  destroy  the  coats  of  the  stom- 
ach if  an  ignorant  practitioner  happens  to  tell  him 
so." 

Lydgate  had  really  lost  sight  of  the  fact  that  Mr. 
Chichely  was  his  Majesty's  coroner,  and  ended  in- 
nocently with  the  question,  "  Don't  you  agree  with 
me,  Dr.  Sprague  ?  " 

"  To  a  certain  extent,  —  with  regard  to  populous 
districts,  and  in  the  metropolis, "  said  the  Doctor. 
"  But  I  hope  it  will  be  long  before  this  part  of  the 
country  loses  the  services  of  my  friend  Chichely, 
even  though  it  might  get  the  best  man  in  our  pro- 
fession to  succeed  him.  I  am  sure  Vincy  will 
agree  with  me. " 

"  Yes,   yes,   give  me  a  coroner  who  is  a  good 


216  MIDDLEMARCH. 

coursing  man,"  said  Mr.  Vincy,  jovially.  "And 
in  my  opinion,  you  're  safest  with  a  lawyer.  No- 
body can  know  everything.  Most  things  are  '  visi- 
tation of  God. '  And  as  to  poisoning,  why,  what 
you  want  to  know  is  the  law.  Come,  shall  we 
join  the  ladies  ?  " 

Lydgate's  private  opinion  was  that  Mr.  Chichely 
might  be  the  very  coroner  without  bias  as  to  the 
coats  of  the  stomach,  but  he  had  not  meant  to  be 
personal.  This  was  one  of  the  difficulties  of  moving 
in  good  Middlemarch  society :  it  was  dangerous  to 
insist  on  knowledge  as  a  qualification  for  any  sala- 
ried office.  Fred  Vincy  had  called  Lydgate  a  prig, 
and  now  Mr.  Chichely  was  inclined  to  call  him 
prick-eared;  especially  when,  in  the  drawing-room, 
he  seemed  to  be  making  himself  eminently  agree- 
able to  Eosamond,  whom  he  had  easily  monopolized 
in  a  tete-d-tete,  since  Mrs.  Vincy  herself  sat  at  the 
tea-table.  She  resigned  no  domestic  function  to 
her  daughter;  and  the  matron's  blooming  good- 
natured  face,  with  the  two  volatile  pink  strings 
floating  from  her  fine  throat,  and  her  cheery  man- 
ners to  husband  and  children,  was  certainly  among 
the  great  attractions  of  the  Vincy  house,  —  attrac- 
tions which  made  it  all  the  easier  to  fall  in  love 
with  the  daughter.  The  tinge  of  unpretentious 
inoffensive  vulgarity  in  Mrs.  Vincy  gave  more 
effect  to  Eosamond's  refinement,  which  was  beyond 
what  Lydgate  had  expected. 

Certainly,  small  feet  and  perfectly  turned  shoul- 
ders aid  the  impression  of  refined  manners,  and 
the  right  thing  said  seems  quite  astonishingly 
right  when  it  is  accompanied  with  exquisite  curves 
of  lip  and  eyelid.  And  Eosamond  could  say  the 
right  thing;  for  she  was  clever  with  that  sort  of 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  217 

cleverness  which  catches  every  tone  except  the 
humorous.  Happily  she  never  attempted  to  joke, 
and  this  perhaps  was  the  most  decisive  mark  of 
her  cleverness. 

She  and  Lydgate  readily  got  into  conversation. 
He  regretted  that  he  had  not  heard  her  sing  the 
other  day  at  Stone  Court.  The  only  pleasure  he 
allowed  himself  during  the  latter  part  of  his  stay 
in  Paris  was  to  go  and  hear  music. 

"  You  have  studied  music,  probably  ? "  said 
Rosamond. 

"  No,  I  know  the  notes  of  many  birds,  and  I 
know  many  melodies  by  ear ;  but  the  music  that  I 
don't  know  at  all,  and  have  no  notion  about,  de- 
lights me,  —  affects  me.  How  stupid  the  world  is 
that  it  does  not  make  more  use  of  such  a  pleasure 
within  its  reach  !  " 

"  Yes,  and  you  will  find  Middlemarch  very 
tuneless.  There  are  hardly  any  good  musicians. 
I  only  know  two  gentlemen  who  sing  at  all  well.  " 

"  I  suppose  it  is  the  fashion  to  sing  comic  songs 
in  a  rhythmic  way,  leaving  you  to  fancy  the  tune, 
—  very  much  as  if  it  were  tapped  on  a  drum  ?  " 

"  Ah,  you  have  heard  Mr.  Bowyer, "  said  Rosa- 
mond, with  one  of  her  rare  smiles.  "  But  we  are 
speaking  very  ill  of  our  neighbours. " 

Lydgate  was  almost  forgetting  that  he  must 
carry  on  the  conversation,  in  thinking  how  lovely 
this  creature  was,  her  garment  seeming  to  be  made 
out  of  the  faintest  blue  sky,  herself  so  immacu- 
lately blond,  as  if  the  petals  of  some  gigantic 
flower  had  just  opened  and  disclosed  her ;  and  yet 
with  this  infantine  blondness  showing  so  much 
ready,  self-possessed  grace.  Since  he  had  had  the 
memory  of  Laure,  Lydgate  had  lost  all  taste  for 


2i8  MIDDLEMARCH. 

large-eyed  silence :  the  divine  cow  no  longer  at- 
tracted him,  and  Kosamond  was  her  very  opposite. 
But  he  recalled  himself. 

"  You  will  let  me  hear  some  music  to-night,  I 
hope. " 

"  I  will  let  you  hear  my  attempts,  if  you  like, " 
said  Rosamond.  "  Papa  is  sure  to  insist  on  my 
singing.  But  I  shall  tremble  before  you,  who 
have  heard  the  best  singers  in  Paris.  I  have  heard 
very  little  :  I  have  only  once  been  to  London.  But 
our  organist  at  St.  Peter's  is  a  good  musician,  and 
I  go  on  studying  with  him. " 

"  Tell  me  what  you  saw  in  London. " 

"  Very  little.  "  (A  more  naive  girl  would  have 
said,  "  Oh,  everything !  "  But  Rosamond  knew 
better. )  "A  few  of  the  ordinary  sights,  such  as 
raw  country  girls  are  always  taken  to. " 

"  Do  you  call  yourself  a  raw  country  girl  ?  "  said 
Lydgate,  looking  at  her  with  an  involuntary  em- 
phasis of  admiration,  which  made  Rosamond  blush 
with  pleasure.  But  she  remained  simply  serious, 
turned  her  long  neck  a  Iitt1e,  and  put  up  her  hand 
to  touch  her  wondrous  hair-plaits,  —  an  habitual 
gesture  with  her  as  pretty  as  any  movements  of  a 
kitten's  paw.  Not  that  Rosamond  was  in  the  least 
like  a  kitten :  she  was  a  sylph  caught  young  and 
educated  at  Mrs.  Lemon's. 

"  I  assure  you  my  mind  is  raw, "  she  said  imme- 
diately ;  "  I  pass  at  Middlemarch.  I  am  not  afraid 
of  talking  to  our  old  neighbours.  But  I  am  really 
afraid  of  you.  " 

"  An  accomplished  woman  almost  always  knows 
more  than  we  men,  though  her  knowledge  is  of  a 
different  sort.  I  am  sure  you  could  teach  me  a 
thousand  things, —  as  an  exquisite  bird  could  teach 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  219 

a  bear  if  there  were  any  common  language  between 
them.  Happily,  there  is  a  common  language  be- 
tween women  and  men,  and  so  the  bears  can  get 
taught. " 

"  Ah,  there  is  Fred  beginning  to  strum !  I  must 
go  and  hinder  him  from  jarring  all  your  nerves," 
said  Eosamond,  moving  to  the  other  side  of  the  room, 
where  Fred  having  opened  the  piano,  at  his  father's 
desire,  that  Eosamond  might  give  them  some  mu- 
sic, was  parenthetically  performing  "  Cherry  Eipe  !* 
with  one  hand.  Able  men  who  have  passed  their 
examinations  will  do  these  things  sometimes,  not 
less  than  the  plucked  Fred. 

"  Fred,  pray  defer  your  practising  till  to-morrow  ; 
you  will  make  Mr.  Lydgate  ill, "  said  Eosamond. 
"  He  has  an  ear.  " 

Fred  laughed,  and  went  on  with  his  tune  to  the 
end. 

Eosamond  turned  to  Lydgate,  smiling  gently, 
and  said,  "  You  perceive,  the  bears  will  not  always 
be  taught.  " 

"Now  then,  Eosy!"  said  Fred,  springing  from 
the  stool  and  twisting  it  upward  for  her,  with  a 
hearty  expectation  of  enjoyment.  "  Some  good 
rousing  tunes  first " 

Eosamond  played  admirably.  Her  master  at 
Mrs.  Lemon's  school  (close  to  a  county  town  with 
a  memorable  history  that  had  its  relics  in  church 
and  castle)  was  one  of  those  excellent  musicians 
here  and  there  to  be  found  in  our  provinces,  worthy 
to  compare  with  many  a  noted  Kapellmeister  in  a 
country  which  offers  more  plentiful  conditions  of 
musical  celebrity.  Eosamond,  with  the  execu- 
tant's instinct,  had  seized  his  manner  of  playing, 
and  gave  forth  his  large  rendering  of  noble  music 


220  MIDDLEMARCH. 

with  the  precision  of  an  echo.  It  was  almost 
startling,  heard  for  the  first  time.  A  hidden  soul 
seemed  to  be  flowing  forth  from  Eosamoud's  fin- 
gers ;  and  so  indeed  it  was,  since  souls  live  on  in 
perpetual  echoes,  and  to  all  fine  expression  there 
goes  somewhere  an  originating  activity,  if  it  be 
only  that  of  an  interpreter.  Lydgate  was  taken 
possession  of,  and  began  to  believe  in  her  as  some- 
thing exceptional.  After  all,  he  thought,  one 
need  not  be  surprised  to  find  the  rare  conjunctions 
of  nature  under  circumstances  apparently  unfav- 
ourable :  come  where  they  may,  they  always  de- 
pend on  conditions  that  are  not  obvious.  He  sat 
looking  at  her,  and  did  not  rise  to  pay  her  any 
compliments,  leaving  that  to  others,  now  that  his 
admiration  was  deepened. 

Her  singing  was  less  remarkable,  but  also  well 
trained,  and  sweet  to  hear  as  a  chime  perfectly 
in  tune.  It  is  true  she  sang  "  Meet  me  by  Moon- 
light, "  and  "  I  've  been  roaming ;  "  for  mortals 
must  share  the  fashions  of  their  time,  and  none 
but  the  ancients  can  be  always  classical.  But 
Eosamond  could  also  sing  "  Black-  eyed  Susan  " 
with  effect,  or  Haydn's  canzonets,  or  "  Voi,  che 
sapete, "  or  "  Batti,  batti, "  —  she  only  wanted  to 
know  what  her  audience  liked. 

Her  father  looked  round  at  the  company,  de- 
lighting in  their  admiration.  Her  mother  sat, 
like  a  Niobe  before  her  troubles,  with  her  young- 
est little  girl  on  her  lap,  softly  beating  the  child's 
hand  up  and  down  in  time  to  the  music.  And 
Fred,  notwithstanding  his  general  scepticism  about 
Eosy,  listened  to  her  music  with  perfect  allegiance, 
wishing  he  could  do  the  same  thing  on  his  flute. 
It  was  the  pleasantest  family  party  that  Lydgate 


OLD  AND   YOUNG.  221 

had  seen  since  he  came  to  Middlemarch.  The 
Vincys  had  the  readiness  to  enjoy,  the  rejection  of 
all  anxiety,  and  the  belief  in  life  as  a  merry  lot, 
which  made  a  house  exceptional  in  most  county 
towns  at  that  time,  when  Evangelicalism  had  cast 
a  certain  suspicion  as  of  plague-infection  over  the 
few  amusements  which  survived  in  the  provinces. 
At  the  Vincys'  there  was  always  whist,  and  the 
card-tables  stood  ready  now,  making  some  of  the 
company  secretly  impatient  of  the  music.  Before 
it  ceased  Mr.  Farebrother  came  in, —  a  handsome, 
broad-chested,  but  otherwise  small  man,  about 
forty,  whose  black  was  very  threadbare :  the  bril- 
liancy was  all  in  his  quick  gray  eyes.  He  came 
like  a  pleasant  change  in  the  light,  arresting  little 
Louisa  with  fatherly  nonsense  as  she  was  being  led 
out  of  the  room  by  Miss  Morgan,  greeting  every- 
body with  some  special  word,  and  seeming  to  con- 
dense more  talk  into  ten  minutes  than  had  been 
held  all  through  the  evening.  He  claimed  from 
Lydgate  the  fulfilment  of  a  promise  to  come  and 
see  him.  "  I  can't  let  you  off,  you  know,  because 
I  have  some  beetles  to  show  you.  We  collectors 
feel  an  interest  in  every  new  man  till  he  has  seen 
all  we  have  to  show  him.  " 

But  soon  he  swerved  to  the  whist-table,  rubbing 
his  hands  and  saying,  "  Come  now,  let  us  be  seri- 
ous !  Mr.  Lydgate  ?  not  play  ?  Ah !  you  are  too 
young  and  light  for  this  kind  of  thing.  " 

Lydgate  said  to  himself  that  the  clergyman 
whose  abilities  were  so  painful  to  Mr.  Bulstrode, 
appeared  to  have  found  an  agreeable  resort  in  this 
certainly  not  erudite  household.  He  could  half 
understand  it :  the  good-humour,  the  good  looks  of 
elder  and  younger,  and  the  provision  for  passing 


222  MIDDLEMARCH. 

the  time  without  any  labour  of  intelligence,  might 
make  the  house  beguiling  to  people  who  had  no 
particular  use  for  their  odd  hours. 

Everything  looked  blooming  and  joyous  except 
Miss  Morgan,  who  was  brown,  dull,  and  resigned, 
and  altogether,  as  Mrs.  Vincy  often  said,  just  the 
sort  of  person  for  a  governess.  Lydgate  did  not 
mean  to  pay  many  such  visits  himself.  They  were 
a  wretched  waste  of  the  evenings ;  and  now,  when 
he  had  talked  a  little  more  to  Eosamond  he  meant 
to  excuse  himself  and  go. 

"  You  will  not  like  us  at  Middlemarch,  I  feel 
sure, "  she  said,  when  the  whist-players  were  set- 
tled. "  We  are  very  stupid,  and  you  have  been 
used  to  something  quite  different. " 

"  I  suppose  all  country  towns  are  pretty  much 
alike, "  said  Lydgate.  *  But  I  have  noticed  that 
one  always  believes  one's  own  town  to  be  more 
stupid  than  any  other.  I  have  made  up  my  mind 
to  take  Middlemarch  as  it  comes,  and  shall  be 
much  obliged  if  the  town  will  take  me  in  the 
same  way.  I  have  certainly  found  some  charms 
in  it  which  are  much  greater  than  I  had  expected. " 
•  "  You  mean  the  rides  towards  Tipton  and  Lo- 
wick ;  every  one  is  pleased  with  those, "  said  Eosa- 
mond, with  simplicity. 

"  No,  I  mean  something  much  nearer  to  me.  " 

Eosamond  rose  and  reached  her  netting,  and 
then  said  :  "  Do  you  care  about  dancing  at  all  ?  I 
am  not  quite  sure  whether  clever  men  ever  dance.  " 

"  I  would  dance  with  you  if  you  would  allow 
me." 

"  Oh !  "  said  Eosamond,  with  a  slight  depreca- 
tory laugh,  "  I  was  only  going  to  say  that  we 
sometimes  have  dancing,  and  I  wanted  to  know 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  223 

whether  you  would  feel  insulted  if  you  were  asked 
to  come. " 

"  Not  on  the  condition  I  mentioned.  " 

After  this  chat  Lydgate  thought  that  he  was 
going,  but  on  moving  towards  the  whist-tables,  he 
got  interested  in  watching  Mr.  Farebrother's  play, 
which  was  masterly,  and  also  his  face,  which  was 
a  striking  mixture  of  the  shrewd  and  the  mild. 
At  ten  o'clock  supper  was  brought  in  (such  were 
the  customs  of  Middlemarch),  and  there  was 
punch -drinking ;  but  Mr.  Farebrother  had  only  a 
glass  of  water.  He  was  winning,  but  there  seemed 
to  be  no  reason  why  the  renewal  of  rubbers  should 
end,  and  Lydgate  at  last  took  his  leave. 

But  as  it  was  not  eleven  o'clock,  he  chose  to 
walk  in  the  brisk  air  towards  the  tower  of  St. 
Botolph's,  Mr.  Farebrother's  church,  which  stood 
out  dark,  square,  and  massive  against  the  star- 
light. It  was  the  oldest  church  in  Middlemarch ; 
the  living,  however,  was  but  a  vicarage  worth 
barely  four  hundred  a  year.  Lydgate  had  heard 
that,  and  he  wondered  now  whether  Mr.  Fare- 
brother  cared  about  the  money  he  won  at  cards ; 
thinking,  "  He  seems  a  very  pleasant  fellow,  but 
Bulstrode  may  have  his  good  reasons. "  Many 
things  would  be  easier  to  Lydgate  if  it  should  turn 
out  that  Mr.  Bulstrode  was  generally  justifiable. 
"  What  is  his  religious  doctrine  to  me,  if  he  carries 
some  good  notions  along  with  it  ?  One  must  use 
such  brains  as  are  to  be  found. " 

These  were  actually  Lydgate 's  first  meditations 
as  he  walked  away  from  Mr.  Vincy's,  and  on  this 
ground  I  fear  that  many  ladies  will  consider  him 
hardly  worthy  of  their  attention.  He  thought  of 
Rosamond  and  her  music  only  in  the  second  place ; 


224  MIDDLEMARCH. 

and  though,  when  her  turn  came,  he  dwelt  on  the 
image  of  her  for  the  rest  of  his  walk,  he  felt  no 
agitation,  and  had  no  sense  that  any  new  current 
had  set  into  his  life.  He  could  not  marry  yet;  he 
wished  not  to  marry  for  several  years ;  and  there- 
fore he  was  not  ready  to  entertain  the  notion  of 
being  in  love  with  a  girl  whom  he  happened  to 
admire.  He  did  admire  Rosamond  exceedingly ; 
but  that  madness  which  had  once  beset  him  about 
Laure  was  not,  he  thought,  likely  to  recur  in  rela- 
tion to  any  other  woman.  Certainly,  if  falling  in 
love  had  been  at  all  in  question,  it  would  have 
been  quite  safe  with  a  creature  like  this  Miss 
Vincy,  who  had  just  the  kind  of  intelligence  one 
would  desire  in  a  woman,  — polished,  refined, 
docile,  lending  itself  to  finish  in  all  the  delicacies 
of  life,  and  enshrined  in  a  body  which  expressed 
this  with  a  force  of  demonstration  that  excluded 
the  need  for  other  evidence.  Lydgate  felt  sure 
that  if  ever  he  married,  his  wife  would  have  that 
feminine  radiance,  that  distinctive  womanhood 
which  must  be  classed  with  flowers  and  music, 
that  sort  of  beauty  which  by  its  very  nature  was 
virtuous,  being  moulded  only  for  pure  and  delicate 
joys. 

But  since  he  did  not  mean  to  marry  for  the  next 
five  years, —  his  more  pressing  business  was  to 
look  into  Louis'  new  book  on  Fever,  which  he  was 
specially  interested  in,  because  he  had  known 
Louis  in  Paris,  and  had  followed  many  anatomical 
demonstrations  in  order  to  ascertain  the  specific 
differences  of  typhus  and  typhoid.  He  went  home 
and  read  far  into  the  smallest  hour,  bringing  a 
much  more  testing  vision  of  details  and  relations 
into  this  pathological  study  than  he  had  ever 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  225 

thought  it  necessary  to  apply  to  the  complexities 
of  love  and  marriage,  these  being  subjects  on 
which  he  felt  himself  amply  informed  by  litera- 
ture, and  that  traditional  wisdom  which  is  handed 
down  in  the  genial  conversation  of  men.  Whereas 
Fever  had  obscure  conditions,  and  gave  him  that 
delightful  labour  of  the  imagination  which  is  not 
mere  arbitrariness,  but  the  exercise  of  disciplined 
power,  —  combining  and  constructing  with  the 
clearest  eye  for  probabilities  and  the  fullest  obedi- 
ence to  knowledge ;  and  then,  in  yet  more  ener- 
getic alliance  with  impartial  Nature,  standing 
aloof  to  invent  tests  by  which  to  try  its  own 
work. 

Many  men  have  been  praised  as  vividly  imagi- 
native on  the  strength  of  their  profuseness  in  in- 
different drawing  or  cheap  narration, —  reports  of 
very  poor  talk  going  on  in  distant  orbs  ;  or  portraits 
of  Lucifer  coming  down  on  his  bad  errands  as  a 
large  ugly  man  with  bat's  wings  and  spurts  of  phos- 
phorescence ;  or  exaggerations  of  wantonness  that 
seem  to  reflect  life  in  a  diseased  dream.  But  these 
kinds  of  inspiration  Lydgate  regarded  as  rather 
vulgar  and  vinous  compared  with  the  imagination 
that  reveals  subtle  actions  inaccessible  by  any  sort 
of  lens,  but  tracked  in  that  outer  darkness  through 
long  pathways  of  necessary  sequence  by  the  in- 
ward light  which  is  the  last  refinement  of  Energy, 
capable  of  bathing  even  the  ethereal  atoms  in  its 
ideally  illuminated  space.  He  for  his  part  had 
tossed  away  all  cheap  inventions  where  ignorance 
finds  itself  able  and  at  ease :  he  was  enamoured  of 
that  arduous  invention  which  is  the  very  eye  of 
research,  provisionally  framing  its  object  and  cor- 
recting it  to  more  and  more  exactness  of  relation ; 
VOL.  i.  — 15 


226  MIDDLEMARCH. 

he  wanted  to  pierce  the  obscurity  of  those  minute 
processes  which  prepare  human  misery  and  joy, 
those  invisible  thoroughfares  which  are  the  first 
lurking-places  of  anguish,  mania,  and  crime,  that 
delicate  poise  and  transition  which  determine  the 
growth  of  happy  or  unhappy  consciousness. 

As  he  threw  down  his  book,  stretched  his  legs 
towards  the  embers  in  the  grate,  and  clasped  his 
hands  at  the  back  of  his  head  in  that  agreeable 
afterglow  of  excitement  when  thought  lapses  from 
examination  of  a  specific  object  into  a  suffusive 
sense  of  its  connections  with  all  the  rest  of  our 
existence, —  seems  as  it  were  to  throw  itself  on  its 
back  after  vigorous  swimming,  and  float  with  the 
repose  of  unexhausted  strength,  —  Lydgate  felt  a 
triumphant  delight  in  his  studies,  and  something 
like  pity  for  those  less  lucky  men  who  were  not  of 
his  profession. 

"  If  I  had  not  taken  that  turn  when  I  was  a 
lad, "  he  thought,  "  I  might  have  got  into  some 
stupid  draught -horse  work  or  other,  and  lived  al- 
ways in  blinkers.  I  should  never  have  been  happy 
in  any  profession  that  did  not  call  forth  the  high- 
est intellectual  strain,  and  yet  keep  me  in  good 
warm  contact  with  my  neighbours.  There  is 
nothing  like  the  medical  profession  for  that :  one 
can  have  the  exclusive  scientific  life  that  touches 
the  distance  and  befriend  the  old  fogies  in  the 
parish  too.  It  is  rather  harder  for  a  clergyman : 
Farebrother  seems  to  be  an  anomaly. " 

This  last  thought  brought  back  the  Vincys  and 
all  the  pictures  of  the  evening.  They  floated  in 
his  mind  agreeably  enough,  and  as  he  took  up  his 
bed-candle  his  lips  were  curled  with  that  incipient 
smile  which  is  apt  to  accompany  agreeable  recol- 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  227 

lections.  He  was  an  ardent  fellow,  but  at  present 
his  ardour  was  absorbed  in  love  of  his  work  and  in 
the  ambition  of  making  his  life  recognized  as  a 
factor  in  the  better  life  of  mankind,  —  like  other 
heroes  of  science  who  had  nothing  but  an  obscure 
country  practice  to  begin  with. 

Poor  Lydgate !  or  shall  I  say,  Poor  Eosamond ! 
Each  lived  in  a  world  of  which  the  other  knew 
nothing.  It  had  not  occurred  to  Lydgate  that  he 
had  been  a  subject  of  eager  meditation  to  Eosa- 
mond, who  had  neither  any  reason  for  throwing 
her  marriage  into  distant  perspective,  nor  any 
pathological  studies  to  divert  her  mind  from  that 
ruminating  habit,  that  inward  repetition  of  looks, 
words,  and  phrases,  which  makes  a  large  part  in 
the  lives  of  most  girls.  He  had  not  meant  to  look 
at  her  or  speak  to  her  with  more  than  the  inevita- 
ble amount  of  admiration  and  compliment  which 
a  man  must  give  to  a  beautiful  girl ;  indeed,  it 
seemed  to  him  that  his  enjoyment  of  her  music 
had  remained  almost  silent,  for  he  feared  falling 
into  the  rudeness  of  telling  her  his  great  surprise 
at  her  possession  of  such  accomplishment.  But 
Eosamond  had  registered  every  look  and  word,  and 
estimated  them  as  the  opening  incidents  of  a  pre- 
conceived romance,  —  incidents  which  gather  value 
from  the  foreseen  development  and  climax.  In 
Eosamond 's  romance  it  was  not  necessary  to  ima- 
gine much  about  the  inward  life  of  the  hero,  or  of 
his  serious  business  in  the  world :  of  course,  he 
had  a  profession  and  was  clever,  as  well  as  suffi- 
ciently handsome ;  but  the  piquant  fact  about 
Lydgate  was  his  good  birth,  which  distinguished 
him  from  all  Middlemarch  admirers,  and  presented 
marriage  as  a  prospect  of  rising  in  rank  and  getting 


228  MIDDLEMARCH. 

a  little  nearer  to  that  celestial  condition  on  earth 
in  which  she  would  have  nothing  to  do  with  vulgar 
people,  and  perhaps  at  last  associate  with  relatives 
quite  equal  to  the  county  people  who  looked  down 
on  the  Middlemarchers.  It  was  part  of  Eosa- 
mond's  cleverness  to  discern  very  subtly  the  faint- 
est aroma  of  rank,  and  once  when  she  had  seen  the 
Miss  Brookes  accompanying  their  uncle  at  the 
county  assizes,  and  seated  among  the  aristocracy, 
she  had  envied  them,  notwithstanding  their  plain 
dress. 

If  you  think  it  incredible  that  to  imagine  Lyd- 
gate  as  a  man  of  family  could  cause  thrills  of  satis- 
faction which  had  anything  to  do  with  the  sense 
that  she  was  in  love  with  him,  I  will  ask  you  to 
use  your  power  of  comparison  a  little  more  effec- 
tively, and  consider  whether  red  cloth  and  epau- 
lets have  never  had  an  influence  of  that  sort.  Our 
passions  do  not  live  apart  in  locked  chambers,  but, 
dressed  in  their  small  wardrobe  of  notions,  bring 
their  provisions  to  a  common  table  and  mess  to- 
gether, feeding  out  of  the  common  store  according 
to  their  appetite. 

Eosamond,  in  fact,  was  entirely  occupied  not 
exactly  with  Tertius  Lydgate  as  he  was  in  himself, 
but  with  his  relation  to  her;  and  it  was  excusable 
in  a  girl  who  was  accustomed  to  hear  that  all 
young  men  might,  could,  would  be,  or  actually 
were  in  love  with  her,  to  believe  at  once  that  Lyd- 
gate could  be  no  exception.  His  looks  and  words 
meant  more  to  her  than  other  men's,  because  she 
cared  more  for  them :  she  thought  of  them  dili- 
gently, and  diligently  attended  to  that  perfection 
of  appearance,  behaviour,  sentiments,  and  all  other 
elegances,  which  would  find  in  Lydgate  a  more 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  229 

adequate  admirer  than  she  had  yet  been  conscious 
of. 

For  Eosamond,  though  she  would  never  do  any- 
thing that  was  disagreeable  to  her,  was  industri- 
ous ;  and  now  more  than  ever  she  was  active  in 
sketching  her  landscapes  and  market-carts  and 
portraits  of  friends,  in  practising  her  music,  and 
in  being  from  morning  till  night  her  own  standard 
of  a  perfect  lady,  having  always  an  audience  in  her 
own  consciousness,  with  sometimes  the  not  unwel- 
come addition  of  a  more  variable  external  audience 
in  the  numerous  visitors  of  the  house.  She  found 
time  also  to  read  the  best  novels,  and  even  the 
second  best,  and  she  knew  much  poetry  by  heart. 
Her  favourite  poem  was  "  Lalla  Kookh. " 

"  The  best  girl  in  the  world !  He  will  be  a 
happy  fellow  who  gets  her !  "  was  the  sentiment  of 
the  elderly  gentlemen  who  visited  the  Vincys ; 
and  the  rejected  young  men  thought  of  trying 
again,  as  is  the  fashion  in  country  towns  where 
the  horizon  is  not  thick  with  coming  rivals.  But 
Mrs.  Plymdale  thought  that  Rosamond  had  been 
educated  to  a  ridiculous  pitch,  for  what  was  the 
use  of  accomplishments  which  would  be  all  laid 
aside  as  soon  as  she  was  married  ?  While  her  aunt 
Bulstrode,  who  had  a  sisterly  faithfulness  towards 
her  brother's  family,  had  two  sincere  wishes  for 
Rosamond,  —  that  she  might  show  a  more  serious 
turn  of  mind,  and  that  she  might  meet  with  a  hus- 
band whose  wealth  corresponded  to  her  habits. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

"  The  clerkly  person  smiled  and  said, 
Promise  was  a  pretty  maid, 
But  being  poor  she  died  unwed." 

THE  Eev.  Camden  Farebrother,  whom  Lydgate 
went  to  see  the  next  evening,  lived  in  an  old  par- 
sonage, built  of  stone,  venerable  enough  to  match 
the  church  which  it  looked  out  upon.  All  the 
furniture  too  in  the  house  was  old,  but  with  an- 
other grade  of  age, — that  of  Mr.  Farebrother's 
father  and  grandfather.  There  were  painted  white 
chairs,  with  gilding  and  wreaths  on  them,  and 
some  lingering  red  silk  damask  with  slits  in  it. 
There  were  engraved  portraits  of  Lord  Chancellors 
and  other  celebrated  lawyers  of  the  last  century ; 
and  there  were  old  pier-glasses  to  reflect  them,  as 
well  as  the  little  satin-wood  tables  and  the  sofas 
resembling  a  prolongation  of  uneasy  chairs,  all 
standing  in  relief  against  the  dark  wainscot.  This 
was  the  physiognomy  of  the  drawing-room  into 
which  Lydgate  was  shown;  and  there  were  three 
ladies  to  receive  him,  who  were  also  old-fashioned, 
and  of  a  faded  but  genuine  respectability :  Mrs. 
Farebrother,  the  vicar's  white-haired  mother,  he- 
frilled  and  kerchiefed  with  dainty  cleanliness, 
upright,  quick-eyed,  and  still  under  seventy  ;  Miss 
Noble,  her  sister,  a  tiny  old  lady  of  meeker  as- 
pect, with  frills  and  kerchief  decidedly  more  worn 
and  mended ;  and  Miss  Winifred  Farebrother,  the 
Vicar's  elder  sister,  well-looking  like  himself,  but 
nipped  and  subdued  as  single  women  are  apt  to  be 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  231 

who  spend  their  lives  in  uninterrupted  subjection 
to  their  elders.  Lydgate  had  not  expected  to  see 
so  quaint  a  group  :  knowing  simply  that  Mr.  Fare- 
brother  was  a  bachelor,  he  had  thought  of  being 
ushered  into  a  snuggery  where  the  chief  furniture 
would  probably  be  books  and  collections  of  natural 
objects.  The  Vicar  himself  seemed  to  wear  rather  a 
changed  aspect,  as  most  men  do  when  acquaintances 
made  elsewhere  see  them  for  the  first  time  in  their 
own  homes  ;  some,  indeed,  showing  like  an  actor  of 
genial  parts  disadvantageously  cast  for  the  curmud- 
geon in  a  new  piece.  This  was  not  the  case  with 
Mr.  Farebrother  :  he  seemed  a  trifle  milder  and  more 
silent,  the  chief  talker  being  his  mother,  while  he 
only  put  in  a  good-humoured  moderating  remark 
here  and  there.  The  old  lady  was  evidently  accus- 
tomed to  tell  her  company  what  they  ought  to 
think,  and  to  regard  no  subject  as  quite  safe  with- 
out her  steering.  She  was  afforded  leisure  for  this 
function  by  having  all  her  little  wants  attended  to 
by  Miss  Winifred.  Meanwhile  tiny  Miss  Noble 
carried  on  her  arm  a  small  basket,  into  which  she 
diverted  a  bit  of  sugar,  which  she  had  first  dropped 
in  her  saucer  as  if  by  mistake ;  looking  round 
furtively  afterwards,  and  reverting  to  her  teacup 
with  a  small  innocent  noise  as  of  a  tiny  timid 
quadruped.  Pray  think  no  ill  of  Miss  Noble.  That 
basket  held  small  savings  from  her  more  portable 
food,  destined  for  the  children  of  her  poor  friends 
among  whom  she  trotted  on  fine  mornings ;  foster- 
ing and  petting  all  needy  creatures  being  so  spon- 
taneous a  delight  to  her  that  she  regarded  it  much 
as  if  it  had  been  a  pleasant  vice  that  she  was 
addicted  to.  Perhaps  she  was  conscious  of  being 
tempted  to  steal  from  those  who  had  much  that 


232  MIDDLEMARCH. 

she  might  give  to  those  who  had  nothing,  and  car- 
ried in  her  conscience  the  guilt  of  that  repressed 
desire.  One  must  be  poor  to  know  the  luxury  of 
giving! 

Mrs.  Farebrother  welcomed  the  guest  with  a 
lively  formality  and  precision.  She  presently 
informed  him  that  they  were  not  often  in  want  of 
medical  aid  in  that  house.  She  had  brought  up 
her  children  to  wear  flannel  and  not  to  over-eat 
themselves,  which  last,  habit  she  considered  the 
chief  reason  why  people  needed  doctors.  Lydgate 
pleaded  for  those  whose  fathers  and  mothers  had 
over-eaten  themselves,  but  Mrs.  Farebrother  held 
that  view  of  things  dangerous :  Nature  was  more 
just  than  that ;  it  would  be  easy  for  any  felon  to 
say  that  his  ancestors  ought  to  have  been  hanged 
instead  of  him.  If  those  who  had  bad  fathers  and 
mothers  were  bad  themselves,  they  were  hanged 
for  that.  There  was  no  need  to  go  back  on  what 
you  couldn't  see. 

"  My  mother  is  like  old  George  the  Third, "  said 
the  Vicar ;  "  she  objects  to  metaphysics. " 

"  I  object  to  what  is  wrong,  Camden.  I  say, 
keep  hold  of  a  few  plain  truths,  and  make  every- 
thing square  with  them.  When  I  was  young,  Mr. 
Lydgate,  there  never  was  any  question  about  right 
and  wrong.  We  knew  our  catechism,  and  that 
was  enough  ;  we  learned  our  creed  and  our  duty. 
Every  respectable  Church  person  had  the  same 
opinions.  But  now,  if  you  speak  out  of  the 
Prayer-book  itself,  you  are  liable  to  be  con- 
tradicted. " 

"  That  makes  rather  a  pleasant  time  of  it  for 
those  who  like  to  maintain  their  own  point, "  said 
Lydgate. 


OLD   AND  YOUNG.  233 

"  But  my  mother  always  gives  way,  *  said  the 
Vicar,  slyly. 

"  No,  no,  Camden,  you  must  not  lead  Mr.  Lyd- 
gate  into  a  mistake  about  me.  I  shall  never  show 
that  disrespect  to  my  parents,  to  give  up  what 
they  taught  me.  Any  one  may  see  what  comes  of 
turning.  If  you  change  once,  why  not  twenty 
times  ?  " 

"  A  man  might  see  good  arguments  for  changing 
once,  and  not  see  them  for  changing  again, "  said 
Lydgate,  amused  with  the  decisive  old  lady. 

"  Excuse  me  there.  If  you  go  upon  arguments, 
they  are  never  wanting,  when  a  man  has  no  con- 
stancy of  mind.  My  father  never  changed,  and  he 
preached  plain  moral  sermons  without  arguments, 
and  was  a  good  man,  —  few  better.  When  you  get 
me  a  good  man  made  out  of  arguments,  I  will  get 
you  a  good  dinner  with  reading  you  the  cookery- 
book.  That 's  my  opinion,  and  I  think  anybody's 
stomach  will  bear  me  out " 

"  About  the  dinner  certainly,  mother, "  said  Mr. 
Farebrother. 

"  It  is  the  same  thing,  the  dinner  or  the  man. 
I  am  nearly  seventy,  Mr.  Lydgate,  and  I  go  upon 
experience.  I  am  not  likely  to  follow  new  lights, 
though  there  are  plenty  of  them  here  as  elsewhere. 
I  say,  they  came  in  with  the  mixed  stuffs  that  will 
neither  wash  nor  wear.  It  was  not  so  in  my  youth  : 
a  Churchman  was  a  Churchman,  and  a  clergyman, 
you  might  be  pretty  sure,  was  a  gentleman,  if 
nothing  else.  But  now  he  may  be  no  better  than  a 
Dissenter,  and  want  to  push  aside  my  son  on  pre- 
tence of  doctrine.  But  whoever  may  wish  to  push 
him  aside,  I  am  proud  to  say,  Mr.  Lydgate,  that  he 
will  compare  with  any  preacher  in  this  kingdom, 


234  MIDDLEMARCH. 

not  to  speak  of  this  town,  which  is  but  a  low 
standard  to  go  by ;  at  least,  to  my  thinking,  for  I 
was  born  and  bred  at  Exeter.  " 

"  A  mother  is  never  partial, "  said  Mr.  Fare- 
brother,  smiling.  "  What  do  you  think  Tyke's 
mother  says  about  him  ?  " 

"  Ah,  poor  creature !  what  indeed  ?  "  said  Mrs. 
Farebrother,  her  sharpness  blunted  for  the  moment 
by  her  confidence  in  maternal  judgments.  "  She 
says  the  truth  to  herself,  depend  upon  it. " 

"  And  what  is  the  truth  ? "  said  Lydgate.  *  I  am 
curious  to  know. " 

"  Oh,  nothing  bad  at  all, "  said  Mr.  Farebrother. 
"  He  is  a  zealous  fellow :  not  very  learned,  and 
not  very  wise,  I  think,  — because  I  don't  agree 
with  him.  " 

"  Why,  Camden  !  "  said  Miss  Winifred,  "  Griffin 
and  his  wife  told  me  only  to-day,  that  Mr.  Tyke 
said  they  should  have  no  more  coals  if  they  came 
to  hear  you  preach.  " 

Mrs.  Farebrother  laid  down  her  knitting,  which 
she  had  resumed  after  her  small  allowance  of  tea 
and  toast,  and  looked  at  her  son  as  if  to  say,  "  You 
hear  that  ?  "  Miss  Noble  said,  "  Oh,  poor  things ! 
poor  things !  "  in  reference,  probably,  to  the  double 
loss  of  preaching  and  coal.  But  the  Vicar  an- 
swered quietly,  — 

"  That  is  because  they  are  not  my  parishioners. 
And  I  don't  think  my  sermons  are  worth  a  load 
of  coals  to  them.  " 

"  Mr.  Lydgate, "  said  Mrs.  Farebrother,  who 
could  not  let  this  pass,  "  you  don't  know  my  son  : 
he  always  undervalues  himself.  I  tell  him  he  is 
undervaluing  the  God  who  made  him,  and  made 
him  a  most  excellent  preacher.  " 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  235 

"  That  must  be  a  hint  for  me  to  take  Mr.  Lydgate 
away  to  my  study,  mother, "  said  the  Vicar,  laugh- 
ing. "  I  promised  to  show  you  my  collection, "  he 
added,  turning  to  Lydgate ;  "  shall  we  go  ?  " 

All  three  ladies  remonstrated.  Mr.  Lydgate 
ought  not  to  be  hurried  away  without  being  allowed 
to  accept  another  cup  of  tea :  Miss  Winifred  had 
abundance  of  good  tea  in  the  pot.  Why  was  Cam- 
den  in  such  haste  to  take  a  visitor  to  his  den  ? 
There  was  nothing  but  pickled  vermin,  and  drawers 
full  of  blue-bottles  and  moths,  with  no  carpet  on 
the  floor.  Mr.  Lydgate  must  excuse  it.  A  game 
at  cribbage  would  be  far  better.  In  short,  it  was 
plain  that  a  vicar  might  be  adored  by  his  woman- 
kind as  the  king  of  men  and  preachers,  and  yet  be 
held  by  them  to  stand  in  much  need  of  their  direc- 
tion. Lydgate,  with  the  usual  shallowness  of  a 
young  bachelor,  wondered  that  Mr.  Farebrother 
had  not  taught  them  better. 

"  My  mother  is  not  used  to  my  having  visitors 
who  can  take  any  interest  in  my  hobbies, "  said  the 
Vicar,  as  he  opened  the  door  of  his  study,  which 
was  indeed  as  bare  of  luxuries  for  the  body  as  the 
ladies  had  implied,  unless  a  short  porcelain  pipe 
and  a  tobacco-box  were  to  be  excepted. 

"  Men  of  your  profession  don't  generally  smoke, " 
he  said.  Lydgate  smiled  and  shook  his  head. 
"  Nor  of  mine  either,  properly,  I  suppose.  You 
will  hear  that  pipe  alleged  against  me  by  Bulstrode 
and  Company.  They  don't  know  how  pleased  the 
devil  would  be  if  I  gave  it  up. " 

"  I  understand.  You  are  of  an  excitable  temper 
and  want  a  sedative.  I  am  heavier,  and  should 
get  idle  with  it.  I  should  rush  into  idleness,  and 
stagnate  there  with  all  my  might. " 


236  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  And  you  mean  to  give  it  all  to  your  work.  I 
am  some  ten  or  twelve  years  older  than  you,  and 
have  come  to  a  compromise.  I  feed  a  weakness  or 
two  lest  they  should  get  clamorous.  See,"  con- 
tinued the  Vicar,  opening  several  small  drawers, 
0  I  fancy  I  have  made  an  exhaustive  study  of  the 
entomology  of  this  district.  I  am  going  on  both 
with  the  fauna  and  flora ;  but  I  have  at  least  done 
my  insects  well.  We  are  singularly  rich  in 
orthoptera:  I  don't  know  whether —  Ah!  you 
have  got  hold  of  that  glass  jar,  — you  are  looking 
into  that  instead  of  my  drawers.  You  don't  really 
care  about  these  things  ?  " 

"  Not  by  the  side  of  this  lovely  anencephalous 
monster.  I  have  never  had  time  to  give  myself 
much  to  natural  history.  I  was  early  bitten  with 
an  interest  in  structure,  and  it  is  what  lies  most 
directly  in  my  profession.  I  have  no  hobby 
besides.  I  have  the  sea  to  swim  in  there." 

"  Ah !  you  are  a  happy  fellow, "  said  Mr.  Fare- 
brother,  turning  on  his  heel  and  beginning  to  fill 
his  pipe.  "  You  don't  know  what  it  is  to  want 
spiritual  tobacco,  —  bad  emendations  of  old  texts, 
or  small  items  about  a  variety  of  Aphis  Brassicce, 
with  the  well-known  signature  of  Philomicron, 
for  the  '  Twaddler's  Magazine; '  or  a  learned  trea- 
tise on  the  entomology  of  the  Pentateuch,  includ- 
ing all  the  insects  not  mentioned,  but  probably 
met  with  by  the  Israelites  in  their  passage  through 
the  desert ;  with  a  monograph  on  the  Ant,  as 
treated  by  Solomon,  showing  the  harmony  of  the 
Book  of  Proverbs  with  the  results  of  modern 
research.  You  don't  mind  my  fumigating  you?  " 

Lydgate  was  more  surprised  at  the  openness  of 
this  talk  than  at  its  implied  meaning,  —  that  the 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  237 

Vicar  felt  himself  not  altogether  in  the  right  voca- 
tion. The  neat  fitting -up  of  drawers  and  shelves, 
and  the  bookcase  filled  with  expensive  illustrated 
books  on  Natural  History,  made  him  think  again 
of  the  winnings  at  cards  and  their  destination.  But 
he  was  beginning  to  wish  that  the  very  best  con- 
struction of  everything  that  Mr.  Farebrother  did 
should  be  the  true  one.  The  Vicar's  frankness 
seemed  not  of  the  repulsive  sort  that  comes  from 
an  uneasy  consciousness  seeking  to  forestall  the 
judgment  of  others,  but  simply  the  relief  of  a 
desire  to  do  with  as  little  pretence  as  possible. 
Apparently  he  was  not  without  a  sense  that  his 
freedom  of  speech  might  seem  premature,  for  he 
presently  said,  — 

"  I  have  not  yet  told  you  that  I  have  the  advan- 
tage of  you,  Mr.  Lydgate,  and  know  you  better 
than  you  know  me.  You  remember  Trawley,  who 
shared  your  apartment  at  Paris  for  some  time  ? 
I  was  a  correspondent  of  his,  and  he  told  me  a 
good  deal  about  you.  I  was  not  quite  sure  when 
you  first  came  that  you  were  the  same  man.  I 
was  very  glad  when  I  found  that  you  were.  Only 
I  don't  forget  that  you  have  not  had  the  like  pro- 
logue about  me. " 

Lydgate  divined  some  delicacy  of  feeling  here, 
but  did  not  half  understand  it.  "  By  the  way, "  he 
said,  "  what  has  become  of  Trawley  ?  I  have  quite 
lost  sight  of  him.  He  was  hot  on  the  French 
social  systems,  and  talked  of  going  to  the  Back- 
woods to  found  a  sort  of  Pythagorean  community. 
Is  he  gone  ?  " 

"  Not  at  all.  He  is  practising  at  a  German  bath, 
and  has  married  a  rich  patient.  " 

u  Then  my  notions  wear  the  best,  so  far, "  said 


238  MIDDLEMAllCH. 

Lydgate,  with  a  short  scornful  laugh.  *  He  would 
have  it,  the  medical  profession  was  an  inevitable 
system  of  humbug.  I  said,  the  fault  was  in  the 
men,  —  men  who  truckle  to  lies  and  folly.  Instead 
of  preaching  against  humbug  outside  the  walls,  it 
might  be  better  to  set  up  a  disinfecting  apparatus 
within.  In  short,  —  I  am  reporting  my  own  con- 
versation, —  you  may  be  sure  I  had  all  the  good 
sense  on  my  side.  " 

"  Your  scheme  is  a  good  deal  more  difficult  to 
carry  out  than  the  Pythagorean  community, 
though.  You  have  not  only  got  the  old  Adam 
in  yourself  against  you,  but  you  have  got  all  those 
descendants  of  the  original  Adam  who  form  the 
society  around  you.  You  see,  I  have  paid  twelve 
or  thirteen  years  more  than  you  for  my  knowledge 
of  difficulties.  But  "  —  Mr.  Farebrother  broke  off 
a  moment,  and  then  added,  "  you  are  eying  that 
glass  vase  again.  Do  you  want  to  make  an  ex- 
change? You  shall  not  have  it  without  a  fair 
barter. " 

"  I  have  some  sea-mice,  — fine  specimens,  — in 
spirits.  And  I  will  throw  in  Eobert  Brown's  new 
thing,  — '  Microscopic  Observations  on  the  Pollen 
of  Plants,' — if  you  don't  happen  to  have  it 
already. " 

"  Why,  seeing  how  you  long  for  the  monster,  I 
might  ask  a  higher  price.  Suppose  I  ask  you  to 
look  through  my  drawers  and  agree  with  me  about 
all  my  new  species  ?"  The  Vicar,  while  he  talked 
in  this  way,  alternately  moved  about  with  his  pipe 
in  his  mouth,  and  returned  to  hang  rather  fondly 
over  his  drawers.  "  That  would  be  good  disci- 
pline, you  know,  for  a  young  doctor  who  has  to 
please  his  patients  in  Middlemarch.  You  must 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  239 

learn  to  be  bored,  remember.  However,  you  shall 
have  the  monster  on  your  own  terms.  " 

"  Don't  you  think  men  overrate  the  necessity  for 
humouring  everybody's  nonsense,  till  they  get 
despised  by  the  very  fools  they  humour  ?  "  said 
Lydgate,  moving  to  Mr.  Farebrother's  side,  and 
looking  rather  absently  at  the  insects  ranged  in 
fine  gradation,  with  names  subscribed  in  exquisite 
writing.  "  The  shortest  way  is  to  make  your  value 
felt,  so  that  people  must  put  up  with  you  whether 
you  flatter  them  or  not.  " 

"  With  all  my  heart.  But  then  you  must  be  sure 
of  having  the  value,  and  you  must  keep  yourself 
independent.  Very  few  men  can  do  that.  Either 
you  slip  out  of  service  altogether,  and  become  good 
for  nothing,  or  you  wear  the  harness  and  draw  a 
good  deal  where  your  yoke-fellows  pull  you.  But 
do  look  at  these  delicate  orthoptera !  " 

Lydgate  had  after  all  to  give  some  scrutiny  to 
each  drawer,  the  Vicar  laughing  at  himself,  and 
yet  persisting  in  the  exhibition. 

"  Apropos  of  what  you  said  about  wearing  har- 
ness, "  Lydgate  began,  after  they  had  sat  down,  "  I 
made  up  my  mind  some  time  ago  to  do  with  as 
little  of  it  as  possible.  That  was  why  I  deter- 
mined not  to  try  anything  in  London,  for  a  good 
many  years  at  least.  I  didn't  like  what  I  saw 
when  I  was  studying  there,  —  so  much  empty  big- 
wiggism  and  obstructive  trickery.  In  the  coun- 
try people  have  less  pretension  to  knowledge, 
and  are  less  of  companions,  but  for  that  reason 
they  affect  one's  amour-propre  less  :  one  makes  less 
bad  blood,  and  can  follow  one's  own  course  more 
quietly. " 

"  Yes,  — well,  — you  have  got  a  good  start;  you 


240  MIDDLEMARCH. 

are  in  the  right  profession,  the  work  you  feel  your- 
self most  fit  for.  Some  people  miss  that,  and 
repent  too  late.  But  you  must  not  be  too  sure  of 
keeping  your  independence. " 

"  You  mean  of  family  ties  ?  "  said  Lydgate,  con- 
ceiving that  these  might  press  rather  tightly  on 
Mr.  Farebrother. 

"  Not  altogether.  Of  course  they  make  many 
things  more  difficult.  But  a  good  wife  —  a  good 
unworldly  woman  —  may  really  help  a  man,  and 
keep  him  more  independent.  There  's  a  parishioner 
of  mine,  —  a  fine  fellow,  but  who  would  hardly 
have  pulled  through  as  he  has  done  without  his 
wife.  Do  you  know  the  Garths  ?  I  think  they 
were  not  Peacock's  patients. " 

"  No ;  but  there  is  a  Miss  Garth  at  old  Feather- 
stone's,  at  Lowick. " 

"  Their  daughter :  an  excellent  girl.  " 

"  She  is  very  quiet,  —  I  have  hardly  noticed  her.  " 

"  She  has  taken  notice  of  you,  though,  depend 
upon  it. " 

"I  don't  understand,"  said  Lydgate;  he  could 
hardly  say,  "  Of  course. " 

"  Oh,  she  gauges  everybody.  I  prepared  her  for 
confirmation,  —  she  is  a  favourite  of  mine.  " 

Mr.  Farebrother  puffed  a  few  moments  in  silence, 
Lydgate  not  caring  to  know  more  about  the  Garths. 
At  last  the  Vicar  laid  down  his  pipe,  stretched 
out  his  legs,  and  turned  his  bright  eyes  with  a 
smile  towards  Lydgate,  saying,  — 

"  But  we  Middlemarchers  are  not  so  tame  as  you 
take  us  to  be.  We  have  our  intrigues  and  our 
parties.  I  am  a  party  man,  for  example,  and  Bui- 
strode  is  another.  If  you  vote  for  me  you  will 
offend  Bulstrode. " 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  241 

"  What  is  there  against  Bulstrode  ? *  said  Lyd- 
gate,  emphatically. 

"  I  did  not  say  there  was  anything  against  him 
except  that.  If  you  vote  against  him  you  will 
make  him  your  enemy. " 

"  I  don't  know  that  I  need  mind  about  that, "  said 
Lydgate,  rather  proudly ;  "  but  he  seems  to  have 
good  ideas  about  hospitals,  and  he  spends  large 
sums  on  useful  public  objects.  He  might  help  me 
a  good  deal  in  carrying  out  my  ideas.  As  to  his 
religious  notions,  —  why,  as  Voltaire  said,  incanta- 
tions will  destroy  a  flock  of  sheep  if  administered 
with  a  certain  quantity  of  arsenic.  I  look  for  the 
man  who  will  bring  the  arsenic,  and  don't  mind 
about  his  incantations. " 

"  Very  good.  But  then  you  must  not  offend 
your  arsenic-man.  You  will  not  offend  me,  you 
know,"  said  Mr.  Farebrother,  quite  unaffectedly. 
"  I  don't  translate  my  own  convenience  into  other 
people's  duties.  I  am  opposed  to  Bulstrode  in 
many  ways.  I  don't  like  the  set  he  belongs  to: 
they  are  a  narrow  ignorant  set,  and  do  more  to 
make  their  neighbours  uncomfortable  than  to  make 
them  better.  Their  system  is  a  sort  of  worldly- 
spiritual  cliquism :  they  really  look  on  the  rest  of 
mankind  as  a  doomed  carcass  which  is  to  nourish 
them  for  heaven.  But, "  he  added  smilingly,  "  I 
don't  say  that  Bulstrode's  new  hospital  is  a  bad 
thing ;  and  as  to  his  wanting  to  oust  me  from  the 
old  one, — why,  if  he  thinks  me  a  mischievous 
fellow,  he  is  only  returning  a  compliment.  And 
I  am  not  a  model  clergyman,  —  only  a  decent 
makeshift. " 

Lydgate  was  not  at  all  sure  that  the  Vicar 
maligned  himself.  A  model  clergyman,  like  a 

VOL.  I.  —  16 


242  MIDDLEMARCH. 

model  doctor,  ought  to  think  his  own  profession 
the  finest  in  the  world,  and  take  all  knowledge  as 
mere  nourishment  to  his  moral  pathology  and 
therapeutics.  He  only  said,  "  What  reason  does 
Bulstrode  give  for  superseding  you  ? " 

"That  I  don't  teach  his  opinions, — which  he 
calls  spiritual  religion ;  and  that  I  have  no  time  to 
spare.  Both  statements  are  true.  But  then  I 
could  make  time,  and  I  should  be  glad  of  the  forty 
pounds.  That  is  the  plain  fact  of  the  case.  But 
let  us  dismiss  it.  I  only  wanted  to  tell  you  that 
if  you  vote  for  your  arsenic-man,  you  are  not  to 
cut  me  in  consequence.  I  can't  spare  you.  You 
are  a  sort  of  circumnavigator  come  to  settle  among 
us,  and  will  keep  up  my  belief  in  the  antipodes. 
Now  tell  me  all  about  them  in  Paris. " 


CHAPTER  XVIIL 

"  Oh,  sir,  the  loftiest  hopes  on  earth 
Draw  lots  with  meaner  hopes  :  heroic  breasts, 
Breathing  bad  air,  run  risk  of  pestilence ; 
Or,  lacking  lime-juice  when  they  cross  the  Line, 
May  languish  with  the  scurvy." 

SOME  weeks  passed  after  this  conversation  before 
the  question  of  the  chaplaincy  gathered  any  practi- 
cal import  for  Lydgate,  and  without  telling  him- 
self the  reason,  he  deferred  the  predetermination 
on  which  side  he  should  give  his  vote.  It  would 
really  have  been  a  matter  of  total  indifference  to 
him,  —  that  is  to  say,  he  would  have  taken  the 
more  convenient  side,  and  given  his  vote  for  the 
appointment  of  Tyke  without  any  hesitation,  —  if 
he  had  not  cared  personally  for  Mr.  Farebrother. 

But  his  liking  for  the  Vicar  of  St.  Botolph's 
grew  with  growing  acquaintanceship.  That, 
entering  into  Lydgate's  position  as  a  new-comer 
who  had  his  own  professional  objects  to  secure, 
Mr.  Farebrother  should  have  taken  pains  rather  to 
warn  off  than  to  obtain  his  interest,  showed  an 
unusual  delicacy  and  generosity,  which  Lydgate's 
nature  was  keenly  alive  to.  It  went  along  with 
other  points  of  conduct  in  Mr.  Farebrother  which 
were  exceptionally  fine,  and  made  his  character 
resemble  those  southern  landscapes  which  seem 
divided  between  natural  grandeur  and  social 
slovenliness.  Very  few  men  could  have  been  as 
filial  and  chivalrous  as  he  was  to  the  mother,  aunt, 


244  MIDDLEMARCH. 

and  sister,  whose  dependence  on  him  had  in  many 
ways  shaped  his  life  rather  uneasily  for  himself; 
few  men  who  feel  the  pressure  of  small  needs  are 
so  nobly  resolute  not  to  dress  up  their  inevitably 
self-interested  desires  in  a  pretext  of  better  motives. 
In  these  matters  he  was  conscious  that  his  life 
would  bear  the  closest  scrutiny ;  and  perhaps  the 
consciousness  encouraged  a  little  defiance  towards 
the  critical  strictness  of  persons  whose  celestial 
intimacies  seemed  not  to  improve  their  domestic 
manners,  and  whose  lofty  aims  were  not  needed  to 
account  for  their  actions.  Then,  his  preaching 
was  ingenious  and  pithy,  like  the  preaching  of 
the  English  Church  in  its  robust  age,  and  his 
sermons  were  delivered  without  book.  People 
outside  his  parish  went  to  hear  him ;  and,  since  to 
fill  the  church  was  always  the  most  difficult  part 
of  a  clergyman's  function,  here  was  another 
ground  for  a  careless  sense  of  superiority.  Besides, 
he  was  a  likable  man :  sweet-tempered,  ready- 
witted,  frank,  without  grins  of  suppressed  bitter- 
ness or  other  conversational  flavours  which  make 
half  of  us  an  affliction  to  our  friends.  Lydgate 
liked  him  heartily,  and  wished  for  his  friendship. 

With  this  feeling  uppermost,  he  continued  to 
waive  the  question  of  the  chaplaincy,  and  to  per- 
suade himself  that  it  was  not  only  no  proper  busi- 
ness of  his,  but  likely  enough  never  to  vex  him 
with  a  demand  for  his  vote.  Lydgate,  at  Mr.  Bul- 
strode's  request,  was  laying  down  plans  for  the 
internal  arrangements  of  the  new  hospital,  and  the 
two  were  often  in  consultation.  The  banker  was 
always  presupposing  that  he  could  count  in  general 
on  Lydgate  as  a  coadjutor,  but  made  no  special  re- 
currence to  the  coming  decision  between  Tyke  and 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  245 

Farebrother.  When  the  General  Board  of  the  In- 
firmary had  met,  however,  and  Lydgate  had  notice 
that  the  question  of  the  chaplaincy  was  thrown  on 
a  council  of  the  directors  and  medical  men,  to  meet 
on  the  following  Friday,  he  had  a  vexed  sense  that 
he  must  make  up  his  mind  on  this  trivial  Middle- 
march  business.  He  could  not  help  hearing  within 
him  the  distinct  declaration  that  Bulstrode  was 
prime  minister,  and  that  the  Tyke  affair  was  a  ques- 
tion of  office  or  no  office  ;  and  he  could  not  help  an 
equally  pronounced  dislike  to  giving  up  the  prospect 
of  office.  For  his  observation  was  constantly  con- 
firming Mr.  Farebrother's  assurance  that  the  banker 
would  not  overlook  opposition.  "  Confound  their 
petty  politics  ! "  was  one  of  his  thoughts  for  three 
mornings  in  the  meditative  process  of  shaving,  when 
he  had  begun  to  feel  that  he  must  really  hold  a 
court  of  conscience  on  this  matter.  Certainly  there 
were  valid  things  to  be  said  against  the  election  of 
Mr.  Farebrother:  he  had  too  much  on  his  hands 
already,  especially  considering  how  much  time  he 
spent  on  non-clerical  occupations.  Then  again  it 
was  a  continually  repeated  shock,  disturbing  Lyd- 
gate's  esteem,  that  the  Vicar  should  obviously  play 
for  the  sake  of  money,  liking  the  play  indeed,  but 
evidently  liking  some  end  which  it  served.  Mr. 
Farebrother  contended  on  theory  for  the  desirabil- 
ity of  all  games,  and  said  that  Englishmen's  wit  was 
stagnant  for  want  of  them ;  but  Lydgate  felt  cer- 
tain that  he  would  have  played  very  much  less  but 
for  the  money.  There  was  a  billiard-room  at  the 
Green  Dragon,  which  some  anxious  mothers  and 
wives  regarded  as  the  chief  temptation  in  Middle- 
march.  The  Vicar  was  a  first-rate  billiard-player, 
and  though  he  did  not  frequent  the  Green  Dragon, 


246  MIDDLEMARCH. 

there  were  reports  that  he  had  sometimes  been  there 
in  the  daytime  and  had  won  money.  And  as  to  the 
chaplaincy,  he  did  not  pretend  that  he  cared  for  it, 
except  for  the  sake  of  the  forty  pounds.  Lydgate 
was  no  Puritan,  but  he  did  not  care  for  play,  and 
winning  money  at  it  had  always  seemed  a  meanness 
to  him ;  besides,  he  had  an  ideal  of  life  which  made 
this  subservience  of  conduct  to  the  gaining  of  small 
sums  thoroughly  hateful  to  him.  Hitherto  in  his 
own  life  his  wants  had  been  supplied  without  any 
trouble  to  himself,  and  his  first  impulse  was  always 
to  be  liberal  with  half-crowns  as  matters  of  no  im- 
portance to  a  gentleman ;  it  had  never  occurred  to 
him  to  devise  a  plan  for  getting  half-crowns.  He 
had  always  known  in  a  general  way  that  he  was 
not  rich,  but  he  had  never  felt  poor,  and  he  had  no 
power  of  imagining  the  part  which  the  want  of 
money  plays  in  determining  the  actions  of  men. 
Money  had  never  been  a  motive  to  him.  Hence  he 
was  not  ready  to  frame  excuses  for  this  deliberate 
pursuit  of  small  gains.  It  was  altogether  repulsive 
to  him,  and  he  never  entered  into  any  calculation  of 
the  ratio  between  the  Vicar's  income  and  his  more 
or  less  necessary  expenditure.  It  was  possible  that 
he  would  not  have  made  such  a  calculation  in  his 
own  case. 

And  now,  when  the  question  of  voting  had  come, 
this  repulsive  fact  told  more  strongly  against  Mr. 
Farebrother  than  it  had  done  before.  One  would 
know  much  better  what  to  do  if  men's  characters 
were  more  consistent,  and  especially  if  one's  friends 
were  invariably  fit  for  any  function  they  desired  to 
undertake  !  Lydgate  was  convinced  that  if  there 
had  been  no  valid  objection  to  Mr.  Farebrother,  he 
would  have  voted  for  him,  whatever  Bulstrode  might 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  24? 

have  felt  on  the  subject :  he  did  not  intend  to  be  a 
vassal  of  Bulstrode's.  On  the  other  hand,  there-  was 
Tyke,  a  man  entirely  given  to  his  clerical  office,  who 
was  simply  curate  at  a  chapel  of  ease  in  St.  Peter's 
parish,  and  had  time  for  extra  duty.  Nobody 
had  anything  to  say  against  Mr.  Tyke,  except  that 
they  could  not  bear  him,  and  suspected  him  of 
cant.  Eeally  from  his  point  of  view,  Bulstrode 
was  thoroughly  justified. 

But  whichever  way  Lydgate  began  to  incline, 
there  was  something  to  make  him  wince  ;  and  being 
a  proud  man,  he  was  a  little  exasperated  at  being 
obliged  to  wince.  He  did  not  like  frustrating  his 
own  best  purposes  by  getting  on  bad  terms  with 
Bulstrode;  he  did  not  like  voting  against  Fare- 
brother,  and  helping  to  deprive  him  of  function  and 
salary ;  and  the  question  occurred  whether  the  ad- 
ditional forty  pounds  might  not  leave  the  Vicar  free 
from  that  ignoble  care  about  winning  at  cards. 
Moreover,  Lydgate  did  not  like  the  consciousness 
that  in  voting  for  Tyke  he  should  be  voting  on  the 
side  obviously  convenient  for  himself.  But  would 
the  end  really  be  his  own  convenience  ?  Other 
people  would  say  so,  and  would  allege  that  he  was 
currying  favour  with  Bulstrode  for  the  sake  of  mak- 
ing himself  important  and  getting  on  in  the  world. 
What  then  ?  He  for  his  own  part  knew  that  if  his 
personal  prospects  simply  had  been  concerned,  he 
would  not  have  cared  a  rotten  nut  for  the  banker's 
friendship  or  enmity.  What  he  really  cared  for  was 
a  medium  for  his  work,  a  vehicle  for  his  ideas ;  and 
after  all,  was  he  not  bound  to  prefer  the  object 
of  getting  a  good  hospital,  where  he  could  demon- 
strate the  specific  distinctions  of  fever  and  test  the- 
rapeutic results,  before  anything  else  connected  with 


248  MIDDLEMARCH. 

this  chaplaincy  ?  For  the  first  time  Lydgate  was 
feeling  the  hampering  threadlike  pressure  of  small 
social  conditions,  and  their  frustrating  complexity. 
At  the  end  of  his  inward  debate,  when  he  set  out 
for  the  hospital,  his  hope  was  really  in  the  chance 
that  discussion  might  somehow  give  a  new  aspect 
to  the  question,  and  make  the  scale  dip  so  as  to  ex- 
clude the  necessity  for  voting.  I  think  he  trusted  a 
little  also  to  the  energy  which  is  begotten  by  cir- 
cumstances,—  some  feeling  rushing  warmly  and 
making  resolve  easy,  while  debate  in  cool  blood  had 
only  made  it  more  difficult.  However  it  was,  he 
did  not  distinctly  say  to  himself  on  which  side  he 
would  vote ;  and  all  the  while  he  was  inwardly 
resenting  the  subjection  which  had  been  forced 
upon  him.  It  would  have  seemed  beforehand  like 
a  ridiculous  piece  of  bad  logic  that  he,  with  his  un- 
mixed resolutions  of  independence  and  his  select 
purposes  would  find  himself  at  the  very  outset  in 
the  grasp  of  petty  alternatives,  each  of  which  was 
repugnant  to  him.  In  his  student's  chambers  he 
had  prearranged  his  social  action  quite  differently. 

Lydgate  was  late  in  setting  out,  but  Dr.  Sprague, 
the  two  other  surgeons,  and  several  of  the  directors 
had  arrived  early ;  Mr.  Bulstrode,  treasurer  and 
chairman,  being  among  those  who  were  still  absent. 
The  conversation  seemed  to  imply  that  the  issue 
was  problematical,  and  that  a  majority  for  Tyke 
was  not  so  certain  as  had  been  generally  supposed. 
The  two  physicians,  for  a  wonder,  turned  out  to  be 
unanimous,  or  rather,  though  of  different  minds,  they 
concurred  in  action.  Dr.  Sprague,  the  rugged  and 
weighty,  was,  as  every  one  had  foreseen,  an  adher- 
ent of  Mr.  Farebrother.  The  Doctor  was  more 
than  suspected  of  having  no  religion,  but  somehow 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  249 

Middlemarch  tolerated  this  deficiency  in  him  as  if 
he  had  been  a  Lord  Chancellor ;  indeed  it  is  prob- 
able that  his  professional  weight  was  the  more  be- 
lieved in,  the  world-old  association  of  cleverness 
with  the  evil  principle  being  still  potent  in  the 
minds  even  of  lady-patients  who  had  the  strictest 
ideas  of  frilling  and  sentiment.  It  was  perhaps 
this  negation  in  the  Doctor  which  made  his  neigh- 
bours call  him  hard-headed  and  dry-witted  ;  condi- 
tions of  texture  which  were  also  held  favourable  to 
the  storing  of  judgments  connected  with  drugs.  At 
all  events,  it  is  certain  that  if  any  medical  man  had 
come  to  Middlemarch  with  the  reputation  of  having 
very  definite  religious  views,  of  being  given  to 
prayer,  and  of  otherwise  showing  an  active  piety 
there  would  have  been  a  general  presumption 
against  his  medical  skill. 

On  this  ground  it  was  (professionally  speaking) 
fortunate  for  Dr.  Minchin  that  his  religious  sym- 
pathies were  of  a  general  kind,  and  such  as  gave  a 
distant  medical  sanction  to  all  serious  sentiment, 
whether  of  Church  or  Dissent,  rather  than  any  ad- 
hesion to  particular  tenets.  If  Mr.  Bulstrode  in- 
sisted, as  he  was  apt  to  do,  on  the  Lutheran  doctrine 
of  justification,  as  that  by  which  a  Church  must 
stand  or  fall,  Dr.  Minchin  in  return  was  quite  sure 
that  man  was  not  a  mere  machine  or  a  fortuitous 
conjunction  of  atoms ;  if  Mrs.  Wimple  insisted  on 
a  particular  providence  in  relation  to  her  stomach 
complaint,  Dr.  Minchin  for  his  part  liked  to  keep 
the  mental  windows  open,  and  objected  to  fixed 
limits  ;  if  the  Unitarian  brewer  jested  about  the 
Athanasian  Creed,  Dr.  Minchin  quoted  Pope's  "  Essay 
on  Man."  He  objected  to  the  rather  free  style  of 
anecdote  in  which  Dr.  Sprague  indulged,  preferring 


250  MIDDLEMARCH. 

well-sanctioned  quotations,  and  liking  refinement  of 
all  kinds  :  it  was  generally  known  that  he  had  some 
kinship  to  a  bishop,  and  sometimes  spent  his  holi- 
days at  "the  palace." 

Dr.  Minchin  was  soft-handed,  pale-complexioned, 
and  of  rounded  outline,  not  to  be  distinguished 
from  a  mild  clergyman  in  appearance :  whereas  Dr. 
Sprague  was  superfluously  tall ;  his  trousers  got 
creased  at  the  knees,  and  showed  an  excess  of  boot 
at  a  time  when  straps  seemed  necessary  to  any  dig- 
nity of  bearing ;  you  heard,  him  go  in  and  out,  and 
up  and  down,  as  if  he  had  come  to  see  after  the 
roofing.  In  short,  he  had  weight,  and  might  be  ex- 
pected to  grapple  with  a  disease  and  throw  it;  while 
Dr.  Minchin  might  be  better  able  to  detect  it  lurk- 
ing and  to  circumvent  it.  They  enjoyed  about 
equally  the  mysterious  privilege  of  medical  reputa- 
tion, and  concealed  with  much  etiquette  their  con- 
tempt for  each  other's  skill.  Regarding  themselves 
as  Middlemarch  institutions,  they  were  ready  to 
combine  against  all  innovators,  and  against  non-pro- 
fessionals given  to  interference.  On  this  ground 
they  were  both  in  their  hearts  equally  averse  to  Mr. 
Bulstrode,  though  Dr.  Minchin  had  never  been  in 
open  hostility  with  him,  and  never  differed  from 
him  without  elaborate  explanation  to  Mrs.  Bulstrode, 
who  had  found  that  Dr.  Minchin  alone  understood 
her  constitution.  A  layman  who  pried  into  the 
professional  conduct  of  medical  men,  and  was 
always  obtruding  his  reforms,  though  he  was  less 
directly  embarrassing  to  the  two  physicians  than  to 
the  surgeon  apothecaries  who  attended  paupers  by 
contract,  was  nevertheless  offensive  to  the  profes- 
sional nostril  as  such ;  and  Dr.  Minchin  shared 
fully  in  the  new  pique  against  Bulstrode,  excited 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  251 

by  his  apparent  determination  to  patronize  Lydgate. 
The  long-established  practitioners,  Mr.  Wrench  and 
Mr.  Toller,  were  just  now  standing  apart  and  hav- 
ing a  friendly  colloquy,  in  which  they  agreed  that 
Lydgate  was  a  jackanapes,  just  made  to  serve  Bul- 
strode's  purpose.  To  non-medical  friends  they  had 
already  concurred  in  praising  the  other  young  practi- 
tioner, who  had  come  into  the  town  on  Mr.  Peacock's 
retirement  without  further  recommendation  than  his 
own  merits  and  such  argument  for  solid  professional 
acquirement  as  might  be  gathered  from  his  having 
apparently  wasted  no  time  on  other  branches  of 
knowledge.  It  was  clear  that  Lydgate,  by  not  dis- 
pensing drugs,  intended  to  cast  imputations  on  his 
equals,  and  also  to  obscure  the  limit  between  his 
own  rank  as  a  general  practitioner  and  that  of  the 
physicians,  who,  in  the  interest  of  the  profession, 
felt  bound  to  maintain  its  various  grades,  —  espe- 
cially against  a  man  who  had  not  been  to  either  of 
the  English  universities  and  enjoyed  the  absence  of 
anatomical  and  bedside  study  there,  but  came  with  a 
libellous  pretension  to  experience  in  Edinburgh  and 
Paris,  where  observation  might  be  abundant  indeed, 
but  hardly  sound. 

Thus  it  happened  that  on  this  occasion  Bulstrode 
became  identified  with  Lydgate,  and  Lydgate  with 
Tyke  ;  and  owing  to  this  variety  of  interchangeable 
names  for  the  chaplaincy  question,  diverse  minds 
were  enabled  to  form  the  same  judgment  concern- 
ing it. 

Dr.  Sprague  said  at  once  bluntly  to  the  group 
assembled  when  he  entered :  "  I  go  for  Farebrother. 
A  salary,  with  all  my  heart.  But  why  take  it  from 
the  Vicar  ?  He  has  none  too  much, — has  to  insure 
his  life,  besides  keeping  house,  and  doing  a  vicar's 


252  MIDDLEMARCH. 

charities.  Put  forty  pounds  in  his  pocket  and  you  '11 
do  no  harm.  He's  a  good  fellow,  is  Farebrother, 
with  as  little  of  the  parson  about  him  as  will  serve 
to  carry  orders." 

"Ho,  ho!  Doctor,"  said  old  Mr.  Powderell,  a 
retired  ironmonger  of  some  standing,  —  his  interjec- 
tion being  something  between  a  laugh  and  a  Parlia- 
mentary disapproval ;  "  we  must  let  you  have  your 
say.  But  what  we  have  to  consider  is  not  anybody's 
income,  —  it's  the  souls  of  the  poor  sick  people." 
Here  Mr.  Powderell's  voice  and  face  had  a  sincere 
pathos  in  them.  "  He  is  a  real  Gospel  preacher,  is 
Mr.  Tyke.  I  should  vote  against  my  conscience  if  I 
voted  against  Mr.  Tyke,  —  I  should  indeed." 

"Mr.  Tyke's  opponents  have  not  asked  any  one 
to  vote  against  his  conscience,  I  believe,"  said  Mr. 
Hackbutt,  a  rich  tanner  of  fluent  speech,  whose 
glittering  spectacles  and  erect  hair  were  turned  with 
some  severity  towards  innocent  Mr.  Powderell. 
"  But  in  my  judgment  it  behoves  us,  as  Directors, 
to  consider  whether  we  will  regard  it  as  our  whole 
business  to  carry  out  propositions  emanating  from  a 
single  quarter.  Will  any  member  of  the  committee 
aver  that  he  would  have  entertained  the  idea  of  dis- 
placing the  gentleman  who  has  always  discharged 
the  function  of  chaplain  here,  if  it  had  not  been  sug- 
gested to  him  by  parties  whose  disposition  it  is  to 
regard  every  institution  of  this  town  as  a  machinery 
for  carrying  out  their  own  views  ?  I  tax  no  man's 
motives :  let  them  lie  between  himself  and  a  higher 
Power;  but  I  do  say  that  there  are  influences  at 
work  here  which  are  incompatible  with  genuine 
independence,  and  that  a  crawling  servility  is  usu- 
ally dictated  by  circumstances  which  gentlemen  so 
conducting  themselves  could  not  afford  either 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  253 

morally  or  financially  to  avow.  I  myself  am  a  lay- 
man, but  I  have  given  no  inconsiderable  attention  to 
the  divisions  in  the  Church  and  —  " 

"  Oh,  damn  the  divisions ! "  burst  in  Mr.  Frank 
Hawley,  lawyer  and  town-clerk,  who  rarely  presented 
himself  at  the  board,  but  now  looked  in  hurriedly, 
whip  in  hand.  "  We  have  nothing  to  do  with  them 
here.  Farebrother  has  been  doing  the  work  — 
what  there  was  —  without  pay  ;  and  if  pay  is  to  be 
given,  it  should  be  given  to  him.  I  call  it  a 
confounded  job  to  take  the  thing  away  from 
Farebrother." 

"  I  think  it  would  be  as  well  for  gentlemen  not  to 
give  their  remarks  a  personal  bearing,"  said  Mr. 
Plymdale.  "  I  shall  vote  for  the  appointment  of 
Mr.  Tyke,  but  I  should  not  have  known,  if  Mr. 
Hackbutt  hadn't  hinted  it,  that  I  was  a  Servile 
Crawler." 

"  I  disclaim  any  personalities.  I  expressly  said  if 
I  may  be  allowed  to  repeat,  or  even  to  conclude 
what  I  was  about  to  say  —  " 

"  Ah,  here 's  Minchin ! "  said  Mr.  Frank  Hawley  y 
at  which  everybody  turned  away  from  Mr.  Hackbutt, 
leaving  him  to  feel  the  uselessness  of  superior  gifts 
in  Middlemarch.  "  Come,  Doctor,  I  must  have  you 
on  the  right  side,  eh  ? " 

"  I  hope  so,"  said  Dr.  Minchin,  nodding  and  shak- 
ing hands  here  and  there ;  "  at  whatever  cost  to  my 
feelings." 

"  If  there 's  any  feeling  here,  it  should  be  feeling 
for  the  man  who  is  turned  out,  I  think,"  said  Mr. 
Frank  Hawley. 

"  I  confess  I  have  feelings  on  the  other  side  also. 
I  have  a  divided  esteem,"  said  Dr.  Minchin,  rubbing 
his  hands.  "I  consider  Mr.  Tyke  an  exemplary 


254  MtDDLEMARCn. 

man,  —  none  more  so,  —  and  I  believe  him  to  be 
proposed  from  unimpeachable  motives.  I,  for  my 
part,  wish  that  I  could  give  him  my  vote.  But  I 
am  constrained  to  take  a  view  of  the  case  which 
gives  the  preponderance  to  Mr.  Farebrother's  claims. 
He  is  an  amiable  man,  an  able  preacher,  and  has 
been  longer  among  us." 

Old  Mr.  Powderell  looked  on,  sad  and  silent. 
Mr.  Plymdale  settled  his  cravat  uneasily. 

"You  don't  set  up  Farebrother  as  a  pattern  of 
what  a  clergyman  ought  to  be,  I  hope,"  said  Mr. 
Larcher,  the  eminent  carrier,  who  had  just  come  in. 
"  I  have  no  ill-will  towards  him,  but  I  think  we  owe 
something  to  the  public,  not  to  speak  of  anything 
higher,  in  these  appointments.  In  my  opinion  Fare- 
brother  is  too  lax  for  a  clergyman.  I  don't  wish  to 
bring  up  particulars  against  him ;  but  he  will  make 
a  little  attendance  here  go  as  far  as  he  can." 

"  And  a  devilish  deal  better  than  too  much,"  said 
Mr.  Hawley,  whose  bad  language  was  notorious  in 
that  part  of  the  county.  "Sick  people  can't  bear 
so  much  praying  and  preaching.  And  that  meth- 
odistical  sort  of  religion  is  bad  for  the  spirits,  —  bad 
for  the  inside,  eh  ? "  he  added,  turning  quickly  round 
to  the  four  medical  men  who  were  assembled. 

But  any  answer  was  dispensed  with  by  the 
entrance  of  three  gentlemen,  with  whom  there  were 
greetings  more  or  less  cordial.  These  were  the 
Keverend  Edward  Thesiger,  Eector  of  St.  Peter's, 
Mr.  Bulstrode,  and  our  friend  Mr.  Brooke  of  Tipton, 
who  had  lately  allowed  himself  to  be  put  on  the 
board  of  directors  in  his  turn,  but  had  never  before 
attended,  his  attendance  now  being  due  to  Mr.  Bul- 
strode's  exertions.  Lydgate  was  the  only  person 
still  expected. 


OLD  AND  IOUNG.  255 

Every  one  now  sat  down,  Mr.  Bulstrode  presiding, 
pale  and  self -restrained  as  usual.  Mr.  Thesiger,  a 
moderate  evangelical,  wished  for  the  appointment  of 
his  friend  Mr.  Tyke,  a  zealous  able  man,  who,  officiat- 
ing at  a  chapel  of  ease,  had  not  a  cure  of  souls  too 
extensive  to  leave  him  ample  time  for  the  new  duty. 
It  was  desirable  that  chaplaincies  of  this  kind  should 
be  entered  on  with  a  fervent  intention :  they  were 
peculiar  opportunities  for  spiritual  influence ;  and 
while  it  was  good  that  a  salary  should  be  allotted, 
there  was  the  more  need  for  scrupulous  watching 
lest  the  office  should  be  perverted  into  a  mere  ques- 
tion of  salary.  Mr.  Thesiger's  manner  had  so  much 
quiet  propriety  that  objectors  could  only  simmer  in 
silence. 

Mr.  Brooke  believed  that  everybody  meant  well 
in  the  matter.  He  had  not  himself  attended  to  the 
affairs  of  the  Infirmary,  though  he  had  a  strong 
interest  in  whatever  was  for  the  benefit  of  Middle- 
march,  and  was  most  happy  to  meet  the  gentlemen 
present  on  any  public  question,  —  "  any  public  ques- 
tion, you  know,"  Mr.  Brooke  repeated,  with  his  nod 
of  perfect  understanding.  "  I  am  a  good  deal  occu- 
pied as  a  magistrate,  and  in  the  collection  of  docu- 
mentary evidence,  but  I  regard  my  time  as  being  at 
the  disposal  of  the  public  —  and,  in  short,  my 
friends  have  convinced  me  that  a  chaplain  with  a 
salary  —  a  salary,  you  know  —  is  a  very  good  thing, 
and  I  am  happy  to  be  able  to  come  here  and  vote 
for  the  appointment  of  Mr.  Tyke,  who,  I  understand, 
is  an  unexceptionable  man,  apostolic  and  eloquent 
and  everything  of  that  kind  —  and  I  am  the  last 
man  to  withhold  my  vote  —  under  the  circumstances, 
you  know." 

"It  seems  to  me  that  you  have  been   crammed 


256  MIDDLEMARCH. 

with  one  side  of  the  question,  Mr.  Brooke,"  said  Mr. 
Frank  Hawley,  who  was  afraid  of  nobody,  and  was 
a  Tory  suspicious  of  electioneering  intentions.  "  You 
don't  seem  to  know  that  one  of  the  worthiest  men 
we  have  has  been  doing  duty  as  chaplain  here  for 
years  without  pay,  and  that  Mr.  Tyke  is  proposed 
to  supersede  him." 

"Excuse  me,  Mr.  Hawley,"  said  Mr.  Bulstrode. 
"  Mr.  Brooke  has  been  fully  informed  of  Mr.  Fare- 
brother's  character  and  position." 

"  By  his  enemies,"  flashed  out  Mr.  Hawley. 

"  I  trust  there  is  no  personal  hostility  concerned 
here,"  said  Mr.  Thesiger. 

"  I  '11  swear  there  is,  though,"  retorted  Mr. 
Hawley. 

"Gentlemen,"  said  Mr.  Bulstrode,  in  a  subdued 
tone,  "  the  merits  of  the  question  may  be  very  briefly 
stated,  and  if  any  one  present  doubts  that  every 
gentleman  who  is  about  to  give  his  vote  has  not 
been  fully  informed,  I  can  now  recapitulate  the 
considerations  that  should  weigh  on  either  side." 

"  I  don't  see  the  good  of  that,"  said  Mr.  Hawley. 
"  I  suppose  we  all  know  whom  we  mean  to  vote  for. 
Any  man  who  wants  to  do  justice  does  not  wait  till 
the  last  minute  to  hear  both  sides  of  the  question. 
I  have  no  time  to  lose,  and  I  propose  that  the  matter 
be  put  to  the  vote  at  once." 

A  brief  but  still  hot  discussion  followed  before 
each  person  wrote  "  Tyke  "  or  "  Farebrother "  on  a 
piece  of  paper,  and  slipped  it  into  a  glass  tumbler ; 
and  in  the  mean  time  Mr.  Bulstrode  saw  Lydgate 
enter. 

"  I  perceive  that  the  votes  are  equally  divided  at 
present,"  said  Mr.  Bulstrode,  in  a  clear  biting  voice. 
Then,  looking  up  at  Lydgate,  — 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  257 

'"  There  is  a  casting-vote  still  to  be  given.  It  is 
yours,  Mr.  Lydgate :  will  you  be  good  enough  to 
write  ? " 

"  The  thing  is  settled  now,"  said  Mr.  Wrench,  ris- 
ing. "  We  all  know  how  Mr.  Lydgate  will  vote." 

"  You  seem  to  speak  with  some  peculiar  meaning, 
sir,"  said  Lydgate,  rather  defiantly,  and  keeping  his 
pencil  suspended. 

"I  merely  mean  that  you  are  expected  to  vote 
with  Mr.  Bulstrode.  Do  you  regard  that  meaning 
as  offensive  ?  " 

"  It  may  be  offensive  to  others.  But  I  shall  not 
desist  from  voting  with  him  on  that  account." 

Lydgate  immediately  wrote  down  "  Tyke." 

So  the  Eev.  Walter  Tyke  became  chaplain  to  the 
Infirmary,  and  Lydgate  continued  to  work  with  Mr. 
Bulstrode.  He  was  really  uncertain  whether  Tyke 
were  not  the  more  suitable  candidate,  and  yet  his 
consciousness  told  him  that  if  he  had  been  quite  free 
from  indirect  bias  he  should  have  voted  for  Mr. 
Farebrother.  The  affair  of  the  chaplaincy  remained 
a  sore  point  in  his  memory  as  a  case  in  which  this 
petty  medium  of  Middlemarch  had  been  too  strong 
for  him.  How  could  a  man  be  satisfied  with  a  de- 
cision between  such  alternatives  and  under  such 
circumstances  ?  No  more  than  he  can  be  satisfied 
with  his  hat,  which  he  has  chosen  from  among  such 
shapes  as  the  resources  of  the  age  offer  him,  wear- 
ing it  at  best  with  a  resignation  which  is  chiefly 
supported  by  comparison. 

But  Mr.  Farebrother  met  him  with  the  same 
friendliness  as  before.  The  character  of  the  publi^ 
can  and  sinner  is  not  always  practically  incompat- 
ible with  that  of  the  modern  Pharisee,  for  the 
VOL.  i.  — 17 


258  MIDDLEMARCH. 

majority  of  us  scarcely  see  more  distinctly  the  faul- 
tiness  of  our  own  conduct  than  the  faultiness  of 
our  own  arguments,  or  the  dulness  of  our  own 
jokes.  But  the  Vicar  of  St.  Botolph's  had  cer- 
tainly escaped  the  slightest  tincture  of  the  Pharisee, 
and  by  dint  of  admitting  to  himself  that  he  was  too 
•much  as  other  men  were,  he  had  become  remarkably 
unlike  them  in  this,  —  that  he  could  excuse  others 
for  thinking  slightly  of  him,  and  could  judge  impar- 
tially of  their  conduct  even  when  it  told  against 
him. 

"  The  world  has  been  too  strong  for  me,  I  know," 
he  said  one  day  to  Lydgate.  "  But  then  I  am  not  a 
mighty  man,  —  I  shall  never  be  a  man  of  renown. 
The  choice  of  Hercules  is  a  pretty  fable  ;  but  Prodi- 
cus  makes  it  easy  work  for  the  hero,  as  if  the  first 
resolves  were  enough.  Another  story  says  that  he 
came  to  hold  the  distaff,  and  at  last  wore  the  Nes- 
sus  shirt.  I  suppose  one  good  resolve  might  keep  a 
man  right  if  everybody  else's  resolve  helped  him." 

The  Vicar's  talk  was  not  always  inspiriting :  he 
had  escaped  being  a  Pharisee,  but  he  had  not  escaped 
that  low  estimate  of  possibilities  which  we  rather 
hastily  arrive  at  as  an  inference  from  our  own  failure. 
Lydgate  thought  that  there  was  a  pitiable  infirmity 
of  will  in  Mr.  Farebrother. 


CHAPTEE  XIX. 

L'altra  vedete  ch'  ha  fatto  alia  guancia 
Delia  sua  palma,  sospirando,  letto. 

Purgatorio,  viL 

WHEN  George  the  Fourth  was  still  reigning  over 
the  privacies  of  Windsor,  when  the  Duke  of  Wel- 
lington was  Prime  Minister,  and  Mr.  Vincy  was 
mayor  of  the  old  corporation  in  Middlemarch,  Mrs. 
Casaubon,  born  Dorothea  Brooke,  had  taken  her 
wedding  journey  to  Borne.  In  those  days  the  world 
in  general  was  more  ignorant  of  good  and  evil  by 
forty  years  than  it  is  at  present.  Travellers  did  not 
often  carry  full  information  on  Christian  art  either 
in  their  heads  or  their  pockets  ;  and  even  the  most 
brilliant  English  critic  of  the  day  mistook  the 
flower-flushed  tomb  of  the  ascended  Virgin  for  an 
ornamental  vase  due  to  the  painter's  fancy.  Ro- 
manticism, which  has  helped  to  fill  some  dull 
blanks  with  love  and  knowledge,  had  not  yet  pene- 
trated the  times  with  its  leaven  and  entered  into 
everybody's  food ;  it  was  fermenting  still  as  a  dis- 
tinguishable vigorous  enthusiasm  in  certain  long- 
haired German  artists  at  Rome,  and  the  youth  of 
other  nations  who  worked  or  idled  near  them  were 
sometimes  caught  in  the  spreading  movement. 

One  fine  morning  a  young  man  whose  hair  was 
not  immoderately  long,  but  abundant  and  curly, 
and  who  was  otherwise  English  in  his  equipment, 
had  just  turned  his  back  on  the  Belvedere  Torso  in 
the  Vatican  and  was  looking  out  on  the  magnificent 


260  MIDDLEMARCH. 

view  of  the  mountains  from  the  adjoining  round 
vestibule.  He  was  sufficiently  absorbed  not  to  no- 
tice the  approach  of  a  dark-eyed,  animated  German 
who  came  up  to  him  and  placing  a  hand  on  his 
shoulder,  said  with  a  strong  accent,  "Come  here, 
quick !  else  she  will  have  changed  her  pose." 

Quickness  was  ready  at  the  call,  and  the  two  fig- 
ures passed  lightly  along  by  the  Meleager  towards 
the  hall  where  the  reclining  Ariadne,  then  called 
the  Cleopatra,  lies  in  the  marble  voluptuousness 
of  her  beauty,  the  drapery  folding  around  her  with 
a  petal-like  ease  and  tenderness.  They  were  just 
in  time  to  see  another  figure  standing  against  a 
pedestal  near  the  reclining  marble ;  a  breathing 
blooming  girl,  whose  form,  not  shamed  by  the  Ari- 
adne, was  clad  in  Quakerish  gray  drapery ;  her  long 
cloak,  fastened  at  the  neck,  was  thrown  backward 
from  her  arms,  and  one  beautiful  ungloved  hand 
pillowed  her  cheek,  pushing  somewhat  backward 
the  white  beaver  bonnet  which  made  a  sort  of  halo 
to  her  face  around  the  simply  braided  dark-brown 
hair.  She  was  not  looking  at  the  sculpture,  prob- 
ably not  thinking  of  it :  her  large  eyes  were  fixed 
dreamily  on  a  streak  of  sunlight  which  fell  across 
the  floor.  But  she  became  conscious  of  the  two 
strangers,  who  suddenly  paused  as  if  to  contemplate 
the  Cleopatra,  and,  without  looking  at  them,  imme- 
diately turned  away  to  join  a  maid-servant  and 
courier  who  were  loitering  along  the  hall  at  a  little 
distance  off. 

"  What  do  you  think  of  that  for  a  fine  bit  of  an- 
tithesis ?  "  said  the  German,  searching  in  his  friend's 
face  for  responding  admiration,  but  going  on  volu- 
bly without  waiting  for  any  other  answer.  "  There 
lies  antique  beauty,  not  corpse-like  even  in  death, 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  261 

but  arrested  in  the  complete  contentment  of  its  sen- 
suous perfection  ;  and  here  stands  beauty  in  its 
breathing  life,  with  the  consciousness  of  Christian 
centuries  in  its  bosom.  But  she  should  be  dressed 
as  a  nun  ;  I  think  she  looks  almost  what  you  call 
a  Quaker ;  I  would  dress  her  as  a  nun  in  my  pic- 
ture. However,  she  is  married ;  I  saw  her  wedding- 
ring  on  that  wonderful  left  hand,  otherwise  I  should 
have  thought  the  sallow  Geistlicher  was  her  father. 
I  saw  him  parting  from  her  a  good  while  ago,  and 
just  now  I  found  her  in  that  magnificent  pose.  Only 
think !  he  is  perhaps  rich,  and  would  like  to  have 
her  portrait  taken.  Ah  !  it  is  no  use  looking  after 
her  —  there  she  goes  !  Let  us  follow  her  home  ! " 

"  No,  no,"  said  his  companion,  with  a  little  frown. 

"  You  are  singular,  Ladislaw.  You  look  struck 
together.  Do  you  know  her  ? " 

"  I  know  that  she  is  married  to  my  cousin,"  said 
Will  Ladislaw,  sauntering  down  the  hall  with  a  pre- 
occupied air,  while  his  German  friend  kept  at  his 
side  and  watched  him  eagerly. 

"  What !  the  Geistlicher  ?  He  looks  more  like  an 
uncle,  —  a  more  useful  sort  of  relation." 

"  He  is  not  my  uncle.  I  tell  you  he  is  my  second 
cousin,"  said  Ladislaw,  with  some  irritation. 

"  Schon,  schon.  Don't  be  snappish.  You  are  not 
angry  with  me  for  thinking  Mrs.  Second-Cousin  the 
most  perfect  young  Madonna  I  ever  saw  ?" 

"  Angry  ?  Nonsense.  I  have  only  seen  her  once 
before,  for  a  couple  of  minutes,  when  my  cousin 
introduced  her  to  me,  just  before  I  left  England. 
They  were  not  married  then.  I  did  n't  know  they 
were  coming  to  Rome." 

"  But  you  will  go  to  see  them  now  —  you  will  find 
out  what  they  have  for  an  address  —  since  you 


262  MIDDLEMARCH. 

know  the  name.  Shall  we  go  to  the  post  ?  And 
you  could  speak  about  the  portrait." 

"  Confound  you,  Naumann  !  I  don't  know  what 
I  shall  do.  I  am  not  so  brazen  as  you." 

"  Bah !  that  is  because  you  are  dilettantish  and 
amateurish.  If  you  were  an  artist,  you  would  think 
of  Mistress  Second-Cousin  as  antique  form  ani- 
mated by  Christian  sentiment,  —  a  sort  of  Christian 
Antigone,  —  sensuous  force  controlled  by  spiritual 
passion." 

"  Yes,  and  that  your  painting  her  was  the  chief 
outcome  of  her  existence,  —  the  divinity  passing  into 
higher  completeness  and  all  but  exhausted  in  the 
act  of  covering  your  bit  of  canvas.  I  am  amateur- 
ish if  you  like  :  I  do  not  think  that  all  the  universe 
is  straining  towards  the  obscure  significance  of  your 
pictures." 

"But  it  is,  my  dear! — so  far  as  it  is  straining 
through  me,  Adolf  Naumann;  that  stands  firm," 
said  the  good-natured  painter,  putting  a  hand  on 
Ladislaw's  shoulder,  and  not  in  the  least  disturbed 
by  the  unaccountable  touch  of  ill-humour  in  his 
tone.  "  See  now  !  My  existence  presupposes  the 
existence  of  the  whole  universe,  —  does  it  not  ?  and 
my  function  is  to  paint,  —  and  as  a  painter  I  have  a 
conception  which  is  altogether  genialisch,  of  your 
great-aunt  or  second  grandmother  as  a  subject  for  a 
picture  ;  therefore  the  universe  is  straining  towards 
that  picture  through  that  particular  hook  or  claw 
which  it  puts  forth  in  the  shape  of  me  —  not  true  ? " 

"  But  how  if  another  claw  in  the  shape  of  me  is 
straining  to  thwart  it?  —  the  case  is  a  little  less 
simple  then." 

"  Not  at  all :  the  result  of  the  struggle  is  the  same 
thing  —  picture  or  no  picture  —  logically." 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  263 

Will  could  not  resist  this  imperturbable  temper, 
and  the  cloud  in  his  face  broke  into  sunshiny 
laughter. 

"  Come  now,  my  friend,  —  you  will  help  ?  "  said 
Naumann,  in  a  hopeful  tone. 

"  No ;  nonsense,  Naumann !  English  ladies  are 
not  at  everybody's  service  as  models.  And  you 
want  to  express  too  much  with  your  painting.  You 
would  only  have  made  a  better  or  worse  portrait 
with  a  background  which  every  connoisseur  would 
give  a  different  reason  for  or  against.  And  what  is 
a  portrait  of  a  woman  ?  Your  painting  and  Plastik 
are  poor  stuff,  after  all.  They  perturb  and  dull  con- 
ceptions instead  of  raising  them.  Language  is  a  finer 
medium." 

"  Yes,  for  those  who  can't  paint,"  said  Naumann. 
"There  you  have  perfect  right.  I  did  not  recom- 
mend you  to  paint,  my  friend." 

The  amiable  artist  carried  his  sting,  but  Ladislaw 
did  not  choose  to  appear  stung.  He  went  on  as  if 
he  had  not  heard. 

"  Language  gives  a  fuller  image,  which  is  all  the 
better  for  being  vague.  After  all,  the  true  seeing  is 
within ;  and  painting  stares  at  you  with  an  insistent 
imperfection.  I  feel  that  especially  about  represen- 
tations of  women.  As  if  a  woman  were  a  mere 
coloured  superficies  !  You  must  wait  for  movement 
and  tone.  There  is  a  difference  in  their  very  breath- 
ing :  they  change  from  moment  to  moment.  —  This 
woman  whom  you  have  just  seen,  for  example :  how 
would  you  paint  her  voice,  pray?  But  her  voice 
is  much  diviner  than  anything  you  have  seen  of 
her." 

"I  ses,  I  see.  You  are  jealous.  No  man  must 
presume  to  think  that  he  can  paint  your  ideal.  This 


264  MIDDLEMARCH. 

is  serious,  my  friend!  Your  great-aunt!  'Der 
NefiV  als  Onkel '  in  a  tragic  sense,  —  ungeheuer  !  " 

"  You  and  I  shall  quarrel,  Naumann,  if  you  call 
that  lady  my  aunt  again." 

"  How  is  she  to  be  called  then  ? " 

"  Mrs.  Casaubon." 

"Good.  Suppose  I  get  acquainted  with  her  in 
spite  of  you,  and  find  that  she  very  much  wishes  to 
be  painted  ? " 

"  Yes,  suppose ! "  said  Will  Ladislaw,  in  a  con- 
temptuous undertone,  intended  to  dismiss  the 
subject.  He  was  conscious  of  being  irritated  by 
ridiculously  small  causes,  which  were  half  of  his 
own  creation.  Why  was  he  making  any  fuss  about 
Mrs.  Casaubon  ?  And  yet  he  felt  as  if  something 
had  happened  to  him  with  regard  to  her.  There  are 
characters  which  are  continually  creating  collisions 
and  nodes  for  themselves  in  dramas  which  nobody 
is  prepared  to  act  with  them.  Their  susceptibilities 
will  clash  against  objects  that  remain  innocently 
quiet. 


CHAPTER   XX. 

"A  child  forsaken,  waking  suddenly, 
Whose  gaze  afeard  on  all  things  round  doth  rove, 
And  sect  h  only  that  it  cannot  see 
The  meeting  eyes  of  love." 

Two  hours  later,  Dorothea  was  seated  in  an  inner 
room  or  boudoir  of  a  handsome  apartment  in  the 
Via  Sistina. 

I  am  sorry  to  add  that  she  was  sobbing  bitterly, 
with  such  abandonment  to  this  relief  of  an  oppressed 
heart  as  a  woman  habitually  controlled  by  pride  on 
her  own  account  and  thoughtfulness  for  others  will 
sometimes  allow  herself  when  she  feels  securely 
alone.  And  Mr.  Casaubon  was  certain  to  remain 
away  for  some  time  at  the  Vatican. 

Yet  Dorothea  had  no  distinctly  shapen  grievance 
that  she  could  state  even  to  herself;  and  in  the 
midst  of  her  confused  thought  and  passion,  the 
mental  act  that  was  struggling  forth  into  clearness 
was  a  self-accusing  cry  that  her  feeling  of  desolation 
was  the  fault  of  her  own  spiritual  poverty.  She 
had  married  the  man  of  her  choice,  and  with  the 
advantage  over  most  girls  that  she  had  contem- 
plated her  marriage  chiefly  as  the  beginning  of  new 
duties :  from  the  very  first  she  had  thought  of  Mr. 
Casaubon  as  having  a  mind  so  much  above  her  own 
that  he  must  often  be  claimed  by  studies  which  she 
could  not  entirely  share ;  moreover,  after  the  brief 
narrow  experience  of  her  girlhood  she  was  behold- 
ing Rome,  the  city  of  visible  history,  where  the 


266  MIDDLEMARCH. 

past  of  a  whole  hemisphere  seems  moving  in  funeral 
procession  with  strange  ancestral  images  and  trophies 
gathered  from  afar. 

But  this  stupendous  fragmentariness  heightened 
the  dream-like  strangeness  of  her  bridal  life.  Doro- 
thea had  now  been  five  weeks  in  Eome,  and  in  the 
kindly  mornings  when  autumn  and  winter  seemed 
to  go  hand  in  hand  like  a  happy  aged  couple  one  of 
whom  would  presently  survive  in  chiller  loneliness, 
she  had  driven  about  at  first  with  Mr.  Casaubon, 
but  of  late  chiefly  with  Tantripp  and  their  experi- 
enced courier.  She  had  been  led  through  the  best 
galleries,  had  been  taken  to  the  chief  points  of  view, 
had  been  shown  the  grandest  ruins  and  the  most 
glorious  churches,  and  she  had  ended  by  oftenest 
choosing  to  drive  out  to  the  Campagna,  where  she 
could  feel  alone  with  the  earth  and  sky,  away  from 
the  oppressive  masquerade  of  ages,  in  which  her 
own  life  too  seemed  to  become  a  masque  with 
enigmatical  costumes. 

To  those  who  have  looked  at  Eome  with  the 
quickening  power  of  a  knowledge  which  breathes  a 
growing  soul  into  all  historic  shapes,  and  traces  out 
the  suppressed  transitions  which  unite  all  contrasts, 
Rome  may  still  be  the  spiritual  centre  and  inter- 
preter of  the  world.  But  let  them  conceive  one 
more  historical  contrast :  the  gigantic  broken  revela- 
tions of  that  Imperial  and  Papal  city  thrust  abruptly 
on  the  notions  of  a  girl  who  had  been  brought  up  in 
English  and  Swiss  Puritanism,  fed  on  meagre  Prot- 
estant histories  and  on  art  chiefly  of  the  hand-screen 
sort ;  a  girl  whose  ardent  nature  turned  all  her 
small  allowance  of  knowledge  into  principles,  fusing 
her  actions  into  their  mould,  and  whose  quick  emo- 
tions gave  the  most  abstract  things  the  quality  of  a 


OLD    AND  YOUNG.  267 

pleasure  or  a  pain  ;  a  girl  who  had  lately  become  a 
wife,  and  from  the  enthusiastic  acceptance  of  untried 
duty  found  herself  plunged  in  tumultuous  preoccu- 
pation with  her  personal  lot.  The  weight  of  unin- 
telligible Eome  might  lie  easily  on  bright  nymphs  to 
whom  it  formed  a  background  for  the  brilliant  picnic 
of  Anglo-foreign  society :  but  Dorothea  had  no  such 
defence  against  deep  impressions.  Euins  and  basil- 
icas, palaces  and  colossi,  set  in  the  midst  of  a  sordid 
present,  where  all  that  was  living  and  warm-blooded 
seemed  sunk  in  the  deep  degeneracy  of  a  superstition 
divorced  from  reverence ;  the  dimmer  but  yet  eager 
Titanic  life  gazing  and  struggling  on  walls  and  ceil- 
ings ;  the  long  vistas  of  white  forms  whose  marble 
eyes  seemed  to  hold  the  monotonous  light  of  an  alien 
world ;  all  this  vast  wreck  of  ambitious  ideals,  sen- 
suous and  spiritual,  mixed  confusedly  with  the  signs 
of  breathing  forgetfulness  and  degradation,  at  first 
jarred  her  as  with  an  electric  shock,  and  then  urged 
themselves  on  her  with  that  ache  belonging  to  a  glut 
of  confused  ideas  which  check  the  flow  of  emotion. 
Forms  both  pale  and  glowing  took  possession  of  her 
young  sense,  and  fixed  themselves  in  her  memory 
even  when  she  was  not  thinking  of  them,  preparing 
strange  associations  which  remained  through  her 
after-years.  Our  moods  are  apt  to  bring  with  them 
images  which  succeed  each  other  like  the  magic-lan- 
tern pictures  of  a  doze ;  and  in  certain  states  of  dull 
forlorn  ness  Dorothea  all  her  life  continued  to  see  the 
vastness  of  St.  Peter's,  the  huge  bronze  canopy,  the 
excited  intention  in  the  attitudes  and  garments  of 
the  prophets  and  evangelists  in  the  mosaics  above, 
and  the  red  drapery  which  was  being  hung  for 
Christmas  spreading  itself  everywhere  like  a  disease 
of  the  retina. 


268  MIDDLEMARCH. 

Not  that  this  inward  amazement  of  Dorothea's 
was  anything  very  exceptional :  many  souls  in  their 
young  nudity  are  tumbled  out  among  incongruities 
and  left  to  "  find  their  feet "  among  them,  while  their 
elders  go  about  their  business.  Nor  can  I  suppose 
that  when  Mrs.  Casaubon  is  discovered  in  a  fit  of 
weeping  six  weeks  after  her  wedding,  the  situation 
will  be  regarded  as  tragic.  Some  discouragement, 
some  faintness  of  heart  at  the  new  real  future  which 
replaces  the  imaginary,  is  not  unusual,  and  we  do 
not  expect  people  to  be  deeply  moved  by  what  is 
not  unusual.  That  element  of  tragedy  which  lies 
in  the  very  fact  of  frequency,  has  not  yet  wrought 
itself  into  the  coarse  emotion  of  mankind  ;  and  per- 
haps our  frames  could  hardly  bear  much  of  it.  If 
we  had  a  keen  vision  and  feeling  of  -all  ordinary 
human  life,  it  would  be  like  hearing  the  grass  grow 
and  the  squirrel's  heart  beat,  and  we  should  die  of 
that  roar  which  lies  on  the  other  side  of  silence. 
As  it  is,  the  quickest  of  us  walk  about  well  wadded 
with  stupidity. 

However,  Dorothea  was  crying,  and  if  she  had 
been  required  to  state  the  cause,  she  could  only  have 
done  so  in  some  such  general  words  as  I  have  al- 
ready used  :  to  have  been  driven  to  be  more  particu- 
lar would  have  been  like  trying  to  give  a  history 
of  the  lights  and  shadows ;  for  that  new  real  future 
which  was  replacing  the  imaginary  drew  its  mate- 
rial from  the  endless  minutiae  by  which  her  view  of 
Mr.  Casaubon  and  her  wifely  relation,  now  that  she 
was  married  to  him,  was  gradually  changing  with 
the  secret  motion  of  a  watch-hand  from  what  it  had 
been  in  her  maiden  dream.  It  was  too  early  yet  for 
her  fully  to  recognize  or  at  least  admit  the  change, 
still  more  for  her  to  have  readjusted  that  devoted- 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  269 

ness  which  was  so  necessary  a  part  of  her  mental 
life  that  she  was  almost  sure  sooner  or  later  to  re- 
cover it.  Permanent  rebellion,  the  disorder  of  a 
life  without  some  loving  reverent  resolve,  was  not 
possible  to  her;  but  she  was  now  in  an  interval 
when  the  very  force  of  her  nature  heightened  its 
confusion.  In  this  way,  the  early  months  of  mar- 
riage often  are  times  of  critical  tumult,  —  whether 
that  of  a  shrimp-pool  or  of  deeper  waters,  —  which 
afterwards  subsides  into  cheerful  peace. 

But  was  not  Mr.  Casaubon  just  as  learned  as 
before  ?  Had  his  forms  of  expression  changed,  or 
his  sentiments  become  less  laudable  ?  Oh,  wayward- 
ness of  womanhood !  did  his  chronology  fail  him, 
or  his  ability  to  state  not  only  a  theory  but  the 
names  of  those  who  held  it;  or  his  provision  for 
giving  the  heads  of  any  subject  on  demand  ?  And 
was  not  Eome  the  place  in  all  the  world  to  give 
free  play  to  such  accomplishments  ?  Besides,  had 
not  Dorothea's  enthusiasm  especially  dwelt  on  the 
prospect  of  relieving  the  weight  and  perhaps  the 
sadness  with  which  great  tasks  lie  on  him  who  has 
to  achieve  them  ?  —  And  that  such  weight  pressed 
on  Mr.  Casaubon  was  only  plainer  than  before. 

All  these  are  crushing  questions ;  but  whatever 
else  remained  the  same,  the  light  had  changed,  and 
you  cannot  find  the  pearly  dawn  at  noonday.  The 
fact  is  unalterable,  that  a  fellow-mortal  with  whose 
nature  you  are  acquainted  solely  through  the  brief 
entrances  and  exits  of  a  few  imaginative  weeks 
called  courtship,  may,  when  seen  in  the  continuity 
of  married  companionship,  be  disclosed  as  something 
better  or  worse  than  what  you  have  preconceived, 
but  will  certainly  not  appear  altogether  the  same. 
And  it  would  be  astonishing  to  find  how  soon  the 


270  MIDDLEMARCH. 

change  is  felt  if  we  had  no  kindred  changes  to  com- 
pare with  it.  To  share  lodgings  with  a  brilliant 
dinner-companion,  or  to  see  your  favourite  politician 
in  the  Ministry,  may  bring  about  changes  quite  as 
rapid :  in  these  cases  too  we  begin  by  knowing 
little  and  believing  much,  and  we  sometimes  end  by 
inverting  the  quantities. 

Still,  such  comparisons  might  mislead,  for  no  man 
was  more  incapable  of  flashy  make-believe  than  Mr. 
Casaubon :  he  was  as  genuine  a  character  as  any 
ruminant  animal,  and  he  had  not  actively  assisted 
in  creating  any  illusions  about  himself.  How  was 
it  that  in  the  weeks  since  her  marriage,  Dorothea 
had  not  distinctly  observed  but  felt  with  a  stifling 
depression,  that  the  large  vistas  and  wide  fresh  air 
which  she  had  dreamed  of  finding  in  her  husband's 
mind  were  replaced  by  anterooms  and  winding  pas- 
sages which  seemed  to  lead  nowhither  ?  I  suppose  it 
was  that  in  courtship  everything  is  regarded  as  pro- 
visional and  preliminary,  and  the  smallest  sample  of 
virtue  or  accomplishment  is  taken  to  guarantee 
delightful  stores  which  the  broad  leisure  of  marriage 
will  reveal.  But,  the  door-sill  of  marriage  once 
crossed,  expectation  is  concentrated  on  the  present. 
Having  once  embarked  on  your  marital  voyage,  it  is 
impossible  not  to  be  aware  that  you  make  no  way 
and  that  the  sea  is  not  within  sight,  —  that,  in  fact, 
you  are  exploring  an  enclosed  basin. 

In  their  conversation  before  marriage,  Mr.  Casau- 
bon had  often  dwelt  on  some  explanation  or  ques- 
tionable detail  of  which  Dorothea  did  not  see  the 
bearing ;  but  such  imperfect  coherence  seemed  due 
to  the  brokenness  of  their  intercourse,  and,  supported 
by  her  faith  in  their  future,  she  had  listened  with 
fervid  patience  to  a  recitation  of  possible  arguments 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  271 

to  be  brought  against  Mr.  Casaubon's  entirely  new 
view  of  the  Philistine  god  Dagon  and  other  fish- 
deities,  thinking  that  hereafter  she  should  see  this 
subject  which  touched  him  so  nearly  from  the  same 
high  ground  whence  doubtless  it  had  become  so 
important  to  him.  Again,  the  matter-of-course 
statement  and  tone  of  dismissal  with  which  he 
treated  what  to  her  were  the  most  stirring  thoughts, 
was  easily  accounted  for  as  belonging  to  the  sense 
of  haste  and  preoccupation  in  which  she  herself 
shared  during  their  engagement.  But  now,  since 
they  had  been  in  Rome,  with  all  the  depths  of  her 
emotion  roused  to  tumultuous  activity,  and  with 
life  made  a  new  problem  by  new  elements,  she  had 
been  becoming  more  and  more  aware,  with  a  certain 
terror,  that  her  mind  was  continually  sliding  into 
inward  fits  of  anger  and  repulsion,  or  else  into 
forlorn  weariness.  How  far  the  judicious  Hooker 
or  any  other  hero  of  erudition  would  have  been  the 
same  at  Mr.  Casaubon's  time  of  life,  she  had  no 
means  of  knowing,  so  that  he  could  not  have  the 
advantage  of  comparison ;  but  her  husband's  way  of 
commenting  on  the  strangely  impressive  objects 
around  them  had  begun  to  affect  her  with  a  sort  of 
mental  shiver :  he  had  perhaps  the  best  intention  of 
acquitting  himself  worthily,  but  only  of  acquitting 
himself.  What  was  fresh  to  her  mind  was  worn 
out  to  his  ;  and  such  capacity  of  thought  and  feeling 
as  had  ever  been  stimulated  in  him  by  the  general 
life  of  mankind  had  long  shrunk  to  a  sort  of  dried 
preparation,  a  lifeless  embalmment  of  knowledge. 

When  he  said,  "  Does  this  interest  you,  Dorothea  ? 
Shall  we  stay  a  little  longer  ?  I  am  ready  to  stay  if 
you  wish  it,"  —  it  seemed  to  her  as  if  going  or  stay- 
ing were  alike  dreary.  Or,  "  Should  you  like  to  go 


272  MIDDLEMARCH. 

to  the  Farnesina,  Dorothea  ?  It  contains  celebrated 
frescos  designed  or  painted  by  Kaphael,  which  most 
persons  think  it  worth  while  to  visit." 

"  But  do  you  care  about  them  ? "  was  always 
Dorothea's  question. 

"  They  are,  I  believe,  highly  esteemed.  Some  of 
them  represent  the  fable  of  Cupid  and  Psyche,  which 
is  probably  the  romantic  invention  of  a  literary 
period,  and  cannot,  I  think,  be  reckoned  as  a  genu- 
ine mythical  product.  But  if  you  like  these  wall- 
paintings  we  can  easily  drive  thither ;  and  you  will 
then,  I  think,  have  seen  the  chief  works  of  Eaphael, 
any  of  which  it  were  a  pity  to  omit  in  a  visit  to 
Home.  He  is  the  painter  who  has  been  held  to  com- 
bine the  most  complete  grace  of  form  with  sublimity 
of  expression.  Such  at  least  I  have  gathered  to  be 
the  opinion  of  conoscenti." 

This  kind  of  answer  given  in  a  measured  official 
tone,  as  of  a  clergyman  reading  according  to  the 
rubric,  did  not  help  to  justify  the  glories  of  the 
Eternal  City,  or  to  give  her  the  hope  that  if  she 
knew  more  about  them  the  world  would  be  joyously 
illuminated  for  her.  There  is  hardly  any  contact 
more  depressing  to  a  young  ardent  creature  than 
that  of  a  mind  in  which  years  full  of  knowledge 
seem  to  have  issued  in  a  blank  absence  of  interest 
or  sympathy. 

On  other  subjects  indeed  Mr.  Casaubon  showed  a 
tenacity  of  occupation  and  an  eagerness  which  are 
usually  regarded  as  the  effect  of  enthusiasm,  and 
Dorothea  was  anxious  to  follow  this  spontaneous 
direction  of  his  thoughts,  instead  of  being  made  to 
feel  that  she  dragged  him  away  from  it.  But  she 
was  gradually  ceasing  to  expect  with  her  former 
delightful  confidence  that  she  should  see  any  wide 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  273 

opening  where  she  followed  him.  Poor  Mr.  Casau- 
bon  himself  was  lost  among  small  closets  and  wind- 
ing stairs,  and  in  an  agitated  dimness  about  the 
Cabeiri,  or  in  an  exposure  of  other  mythologists'  ill- 
considered  parallels,  easily  lost  sight  of  any  purpose 
which  had  prompted  him  to  these  labours.  With 
his  taper  stuck  before  him  he  forgot  the  absence  of 
windows,  and  in  bitter  manuscript  remarks  on  other 
men's  notions  about  the  solar  deities,  he  had  become 
indifferent  to  the  sunlight. 

These  characteristics,  fixed  and  unchangeable  as 
bone  in  Mr.  Casaubon,  might  have  remained  longer 
unfelt  by  Dorothea  if  she  had  been  encouraged  to 
pour  forth  her  girlish  and  womanly  feeling  —  if  he 
would  have  held  her  hands  between  his  and  listened 
with  the  delight  of  tenderness  and  understanding  to 
all  the  little  histories  which  made  up  her  experience, 
and  would  have  given  her  the  same  sort  of  intimacy 
in  return,  so  that  the  past  life  of  each  could  be 
included  in  their  mutual  knowledge  and  affection  — 
or  if  she  could  have  fed  her  affection  with  those 
childlike  caresses  which  are  the  bent  of  every  sweet 
woman,  who  has  begun  by  showering  kisses  on  the 
hard  pate  of  her  bald  doll,  creating  a  happy  soul 
within  that  woodenness  from  the  wealth  of  her  own 
love.  That  was  Dorothea's  bent.  With  all  her 
yearning  to  know  what  was  afar  from  her  and  to  be 
widely  benignant,  she  had  ardour  enough  for  what 
was  near,  to  have  kissed  Mr.  Casaubon's  coat-sleeve, 
or  to  have  caressed  his  shoe-latchet,  if  he  would 
have  made  any  other  sign  of  acceptance  than  pro- 
nouncing her,  with  his  unfailing  propriety,  to  be  of 
a  most  affectionate  and  truly  feminine  nature,  indi- 
cating at  the  same  time  by  politely  reaching  a  chair 
for  her  that  he  regarded  these  manifestations  as 
VOL.  i.  — 18 


274  MIDDLEMARCH. 

rather  crude  and  startling.  Having  made  his  cleri- 
cal toilet  with  due  care  in  the  morning,  he  was  pre- 
pared only  for  those  amenities  of  life  which  were 
suited  "to  the  well-adjusted  stiff  cravat  of  the 
period,  and  to  a  mind  weighted  with  unpublished 
matter. 

And  by  a  sad  contradiction  Dorothea's  ideas  and 
resolves  seemed  like  melting  ice  floating  and  lost  in 
the  warm  flood  of  which  they  had  been  but  another 
form.  She  was  humiliated  to  find  herself  a  mere 
victim  of  feeling,  as  if  she  could  know  nothing 
except  through  that  medium :  all  her  strength  was 
scattered  in  fits  of  agitation,  of  struggle,  of  despon- 
dency, and  then  again  in  visions  of  more  complete 
renunciation,  transforming  all  hard  conditions  into 
duty.  Poor  Dorothea !  she  was  certainly  trouble- 
some —  to  herself  chiefly  ;  but  this  morning  for  the 
first  time  she  had  been  troublesome  to  Mr.  Casaubon. 

She  had  begun,  while  they  were  taking  coffee, 
with  a  determination  to  shake  off  what  she  inwardly 
called  her  selfishness,  and  turned  a  face  all  cheerful 
attention  to  her  husband  when  he  said,  "  My  dear 
Dorothea,  we  must  now  think  of  all  that  is  yet  left 
undone,  as  a  preliminary  to  our  departure.  I  would 
fain  have  returned  home  earlier,  that  we  might  have 
been  at  Lowick  for  the  Christmas  ;  but  my  inquiries 
here  have  been  protracted  beyond  their  anticipated 
period.  I  trust,  however,  that  the  time  here  has 
not  been  passed  unpleasantly  to  you.  Among  the 
sights  of  Europe,  that  of  Rome  has  ever  been  held 
one  of  the  most  striking  and  in  some  respects  edify- 
ing. I  well  remember  that  I  considered  it  an  epoch 
in  my  life  when  I  visited  it  for  the  first  time  ;  after 
the  fall  of  Napoleon,  an  event  which  opened  the 
Continent  to  travellers.  Indeed  I  think  it  is  one 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  275 

among  several  cities  to  which  an  extreme  hyperbole 
has  been  applied,  — '  See  Eome  and  die  : '  but  in 
your  case  I  would  propose  an  emendation  and  say, 
See  Eome  as  a  bride,  and  live  henceforth  as  a  happy 
wife." 

Mr.  Casaubon  pronounced  this  little  speech  with 
the  most  conscientious  intention,  blinking  a  little 
and  swaying  his  head  up  and  down,  and  concluding 
with  a  smile.  He  had  not  found  marriage  a  raptu- 
rous state,  but  he  had  no  idea  of  being  anything  else 
than  an  irreproachable  husband,  who  would  make  a 
charming  young  woman  as  happy  as  she  deserved 
to  be. 

"  I  hope  you  are  thoroughly  satisfied  with  our 
stay,  —  I  mean,  with  the  result  so  far  as  your  stud- 
ies are  concerned,"  said  Dorothea,  trying  to  keep 
her  mind  fixed  on  what  most  affected  her  husband. 

"Yes,"  said  Mr.  Casaubon,  with  that  peculiar 
pitch  of  voice  which  makes  the  word  half  a  negative. 
"  I  have  been  led  farther  than  I  had  foreseen,  and 
various  subjects  for  annotation  have  presented  them- 
selves which,  though  I  have  no  direct  need  of  them, 
I  could  not  pretermit.  The  task,  notwithstanding 
the  assistance  of  my  amanuensis,  has  been  a  some- 
what laborious  one,  but  your  society  has  happily 
prevented  me  from  that  too  continuous  prosecution 
of  thought  beyond  the  hours  of  study  which  has 
been  the  snare  of  my  solitary  life." 

"  I  am  very  glad  that  my  presence  has  made  any 
difference  to  you,"  said  Dorothea,  who  had  a  vivid 
memory  of  evenings  in  which  she  had  supposed 
that  Mr.  Casaubon's  mind  had  gone  too  deep  during 
the  day  to  be  able  to  get  to  the  surface  again.  I 
fear  there  was  a  little  temper  in  her  reply.  "I 
hope  when  we  get  to  Lowick,  I  shall  be  more  use- 


276  MIDDLEMARCH. 

ful  to  you,  and  be  able  to  enter  a  little  more  into 
what  interests  you." 

"  Doubtless,  my  dear,"  said  Mr.  Casaubon,  with  a 
slight  bow.  '*  The  notes  I  have  here  made  will  want 
sifting,  and  you  can,  if  you  please,  extract  them 
under  my  direction." 

"  And  all  your  notes,"  said  Dorothea,  whose  heart 
had  already  burned  within  her  on  this  subject,  so 
that  now  she  could  not  help  speaking  with  her 
tongue.  "  All  those  rows  of  volumes  —  will  you 
not  now  do  what  you  used  to  speak  of  ?  — will  you 
not  make  up  your  mind  what  part  of  them  you  will 
use,  and  begin  to  write  the  book  which  will  make 
your  vast  knowledge  useful  to  the  world  ?  I  will 
write  to  your  dictation,  or  I  will  copy  and  extract 
what  you  tell  me :  I  can  be  of  no  other  use." 
Dorothea,  in  a  most  unaccountable,  darkly  feminine 
manner,  ended  with  a  slight  sob  and  eyes  full  of 
tears. 

The  excessive  feeling  manifested  would  alone 
have  been  highly  disturbing  to  Mr.  Casaubon,  but 
there  were  other  reasons  why  Dorothea's  words  were 
among  the  most  cutting  and  irritating  to  him  that 
she  could  have  been  impelled  to  use.  She  was  as 
blind  to  his  inward  troubles  as  he  to  hers  ;  she  had 
not  yet  learned  those  hidden  conflicts  in  her  hus- 
band which  claim  our  pity.  She  had  not  yet  lis- 
tened patiently  to  his  heart-beats,  but  only  felt  that 
her  own  was  beating  violently.  In  Mr.  Casaubon's 
ear,  Dorothea's  voice  gave  loud  emphatic  iteration 
to  those  muffled  suggestions  of  consciousness  which 
it  was  possible  to  explain  as  mere  fancy,  the  illusion 
of  exaggerated  sensitiveness  :  always  when  such  sug- 
gestions are  unmistakably  repeated  from  without, 
they  are  resisted  as  cruel  and  unjust.  We  are  an- 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  277 

gered  even  by  the  full  acceptance  of  our  humiliat- 
ing confessions,  —  how  much  more  by  hearing  in 
hard  distinct  syllables,  from  the  lips  of  a  near  ob- 
server, those  confused  murmurs  which  we  try  to 
call  morbid,  and  strive  against  as  if  they  were  the 
oncoming  of  numbness !  And  this  cruel  outward 
accuser  was  there  in  the  shape  of  a  wife,  —  nay,  of 
a  young  bride,  who,  instead  of  observing  his  abun- 
dant pen-scratches  and  amplitude  of  paper  with  the 
uncritical  awe  of  an  elegant-minded  canary-bird, 
seemed  to  present  herself  as  a  spy  watching  every- 
thing with  a  malign  power  of  inference.  Here, 
towards  this  particular  point  of  the  compass,  Mr. 
Casaubon  had  a  sensitiveness  to  match  Dorothea's 
and  an  equal  quickness  to  imagine  more  than  the 
fact.  He  had  formerly  observed  with  approbation 
her  capacity  for  worshipping  the  right  object;  he 
now  foresaw  with  sudden  terror  that  this  capacity 
might  be  replaced  by  presumption,  this  worship  by 
the  most  exasperating  of  all  criticism,  —  that  which 
sees  vaguely  a  great  many  fine  ends,  and  has  not 
the  least  notion  what  it  costs  to  reach  them. 

For  the  first  time  since  Dorothea  had  known 
him,  Mr.  Casaubon' s  face  had  a  quick  angry  flush 
upon  it. 

"  My  love,"  he  said,  with  irritation  reined  in  by 
propriety,  "you  may  rely  upon  me  for  knowing  the 
times  and  the  seasons  adapted  to  the  different  stages 
of  a  work  which  is  not  to  be  measured  by  the  facile 
conjectures  of  ignorant  onlookers.  It  had  been  easy 
for  me  to  gain  a  temporary  effect  by  a  mirage  of 
baseless  opinion ;  but  it  is  ever  the  trial  of  the 
scrupulous  explorer  to  be  saluted  with  the  impatient 
scorn  of  chatterers  who  attempt  only  the  smallest 
achievements,  being  indeed  equipped  for  no  other. 


278  MIDDLEMARCH. 

And  it  were  well  if  all  such  could  be  admonished 
to  discriminate  judgments  of  which  the  true  subject- 
matter  lies  entirely  beyond  their  reach,  from  those 
of  which  the  elements  may  be  compassed  by  a  nar- 
row and  superficial  survey." 

This  speech  was  delivered  with  an  energy  and 
readiness  quite  unusual  with  Mr.  Casaubon.  It 
was  not  indeed  entirely  an  improvisation,  but  had 
taken  shape  in  inward  colloquy,  and  rushed  out 
like  the  round  grains  from  a  fruit  when  sudden 
heat  cracks  it.  Dorothea  was  not  only  his  wife: 
she  was  a  personification  of  that  shallow  world 
which  surrounds  the  ill-appreciated  or  desponding 
author. 

Dorothea  was  indignant  in  her  turn.  Had  she 
not  been  repressing  everything  in  herself  except  the 
desire  to  enter  into  some  fellowship  with  her  hus- 
band's chief  interests? 

"  My  judgment  was  a  very  superficial  one,  —  such 
as  I  am  capable  of  forming,"  she  answered,  with  a 
prompt  resentment,  that  needed  no  rehearsal.  "  You 
showed  me  the  rows  of  notebooks  —  you  have  often 
spoken  of  them  —  you  have  often  said  that  they 
wanted  digesting.  But  I  never  heard  you  speak 
of  the  writing  that  is  to  be  published.  Those 
were  very  simple  facts,  and  my  judgment  went  no 
farther.  I  only  begged  you  to  let  me  be  of  some 
good  to  you." 

Dorothea  rose  to  leave  the  table,  and  Mr.  Casau- 
l^on  made  no  reply,  taking  up  a  letter  which  lay  be- 
side him  as  if  to  reperuse  it.  Both  were  shocked 
at  their  mutual  situation,  —  that  each  should  have 
betrayed  anger  towards  the  other.  If  they  had  been 
at  home,  settled  at  Lowick  in  ordinary  life  among 
their  neighbours,  the  clash  would  have  been  less 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  279 

embarrassing :  but  on  a  wedding  journey,  the  ex- 
press object  of  which  is  to  isolate  two  people  on 
the  ground  that  they  are  all  the  world  to  each  other, 
the  sense  of  disagreement  is,  to  say  the  least,  con- 
founding and  stultifying.  To  have  changed  your 
longitude  extensively,  and  placed  yourselves  in  a 
moral  solitude  in  order  to  have  small  explosions, 
to  find  conversation  difficult  and  to  hand  a  glass  of 
water  without  looking,  can  hardly  be  regarded  as 
satisfactory  fulfilment  even  to  the  toughest  minds. 
To  Dorothea's  inexperienced  sensitiveness,  it  seemed 
like  a  catastrophe,  changing  all  prospects ;  and  to 
Mr.  Casaubon  it  was  a  new  pain,  he  never  having 
been  on  a  wedding  journey  before,  or  found  himself 
in  that  close  union  which  was  more  of  a  subjection 
than  he  had  been  able  to  imagine,  since  this  charm- 
ing young  bride  not  only  obliged  him  to  much  con- 
sideration on  her  behalf  (which  he  had  sedulously 
given),  but  turned  out  to  be  capable  of  agitating  him 
cruelly  just  where  he  most  needed  soothing.  In- 
stead of  getting  a  soft  fence  against  the  cold,  shad- 
owy, unapplausive  audience  of  his  life,  had  he  only 
given  it  a  more  substantial  presence  ? 

Neither  of  them  felt  it  possible  to  speak  again  at 
present.  To  have  reversed  a  previous  arrangement 
and  declined  to  go  out  would  have  been  a  show  of 
persistent  anger  which  Dorothea's  conscience  shrank 
from,  seeing  that  she  already  began  to  feel  herself 
guilty.  However  just  her  indignation  might  be, 
her  ideal  was  not  to  claim  justice,  but  to  give  ten- 
derness. So  when  the  carriage  came  to  the  door, 
she  drove  with  Mr.  Casaubon  to  the  Vatican,  walked 
with  him  through  the  stony  avenue  of  inscriptions, 
and  when  she  parted  with  him  at  the  entrance  to 
the  Library,  went  on  through  the  Museum  out  of 


280  MIDDLEMARCH. 

mere  listlessness  as  to  what  was  around  her.  She 
had  not  spirit  to  turn  round  and  say  that  she  would 
drive  anywhere.  It  was  when  Mr.  Casaubon  was 
quitting  her  that  Nauraann  had  first  seen  her,  and 
he  had  entered  the  long  gallery  of  sculpture  at  the 
same  time  with  her ;  but  here  Naumann  had  to  await 
Ladislaw,  with  whom  he  was  to  settle  a  bet  of  cham- 
pagne about  an  enigmatical  mediaeval-looking  figure 
there.  After  they  had  examined  the  figure  and  had 
walked  on  finishing  their  dispute,  they  had  parted, 
Ladislaw  lingering  behind  while  Naumann  had  gone 
into  the  Hall  of  Statues,  where  he  again  saw  Doro- 
thea, and  saw  her  in  that  brooding  abstraction  which 
made  her  pose  remarkable.  She  did  not  really  see 
the  streak  of  sunlight  on  the  floor  more  than  she 
saw  the  statues  :  she  was  inwardly  seeing  the  light 
of  years  to  come  in  her  own  home  and  over  the  Eng- 
lish fields  and  elms  and  hedge-bordered  highroads  ; 
and  feeling  that  the  way  in  which  they  might  be 
filled  with  joyful  devotedness  was  not  so  clear  to 
her  as  it  had  been.  But  in  Dorothea's  mind  there 
was  a  current  into  which  all  thought  and  feeling 
were  apt  sooner  or  later  to  flow —  the  reaching  for- 
ward of  the  whole  consciousness  towards  the  fullest 
truth,  the  least  partial  good.  There  was  clearly 
something  better  than  anger  and  despondency. 


CHAPTER   XXL 

Hire  facounde  eke  full  womanly  and  plain, 
No  contrefeted  termes  had  she 
To  semen  wise. 

CHAUCEB. 

IT  was  in  that  way  Dorothea  came  to  be  sobbing  as 
soon  as  she  was  securely  alone.  But  she  was  pres- 
ently roused  by  a  knock  at  the  door,  which  made 
her  hastily  dry  her  eyes  before  saying,  "  Come  in.  " 
Tantripp  had  brought  a  card,  and  said  that  there 
was  a  gentleman  waiting  in  the  lobby.  The  courier 
had  told  him  that  only  Mrs.  Casaubon  was  at 
home,  but  he  said  he  was  a  relation  of  Mr. 
Casaubon 's  :  would  she  see  him  ? 

"  Yes, "  said  Dorothea,  without  pause ;  "  show 
him  into  the  salon.  "  Her  chief  impressions  about 
young  Ladislaw  were  that  when  she  had  seen  him 
at  Lowick  she  had  been  made  aware  of  Mr.  Casau- 
bon's  generosity  towards  him,  and  also  that  she 
had  been  interested  in  his  own  hesitation  about 
his  career.  She  was  alive  to  anything  that  gave 
her  an  opportunity  for  active  sympathy,  and  at 
this  moment  it  seemed  as  if  the  visit  had  come 
to  shake  her  out  of  her  self-absorbed  discontent, 
—  to  remind  her  of  her  husband's  goodness,  and 
make  her  feel  that  she  had  now  the  right  to  be  his 
helpmate  in  all  kind  deeds.  She  waited  a  minute 
or  two,  but  when  she  passed  into  the  next  room 
there  were  just  signs  enough  that  she  had  been 
crying  to  make  her  open  face  look  more  youthful 


282  MIDDLEMARCH. 

and  appealing  than  usual.  She  met  Ladislaw 
with  that  exquisite  smile  of  good-will  which  is 
unmixed  with  vanity,  and  held  out  her  hand  to 
him.  He  was  the  elder  by  several  years,  but  at 
that  moment  he  looked  much  the  younger,  for  his 
transparent  complexion  flushed  suddenly,  and  he 
spoke  with  a  shyness  extremely  unlike  the  ready 
indifference  of  his  manner  with  his  male  compan- 
ion, while  Dorothea  became  all  the  calmer  with  a 
wondering  desire  to  put  him  at  ease. 

"  I  was  not  aware  that  you  and  Mr.  Casaubon 
were  in  Eome,  until  this  morning,  when  I  saw 
you  in  the  Vatican  Museum, "  he  said.  "  I  knew 
you  at  once  —  but  —  I  mean,  that  I  concluded  Mr. 
Casaubon 's  address  would  be  found  at  the  Poste 
Kestante,  and  I  was  anxious  to  pay  my  respects 
to  him  and  you  as  early  as  possible. " 

"  Pray  sit  down.  He  is  not  here  now,  but  he 
will  be  glad  to  hear  of  you,  I  am  sure, "  said  Doro- 
thea, seating  herself  unthinkingly  between  the  fire 
and  the  light  of  the  tall  window,  and  pointing  to 
a  chair  opposite,  with  the  quietude  of  a  benignant 
matron.  The  signs  of  girlish  sorrow  in  her  face 
were  only  the  more  striking.  "  Mr.  Casaubon  is 
much  engaged;  but  you  will  leave  your  address, 
—  will  you  not  ?  —  and  he  will  write  to  you.  " 

"  You  are  very  good, "  said  Ladislaw,  beginning 
to  lose  his  diffidence  in  the  interest  with  which  he 
was  observing  the  signs  of  weeping  which  had 
altered  her  face.  "  My  address  is  on  my  card. 
But  if  you  will  allow  me  I  will  call  again  to- 
morrow at  an  hour  when  Mr.  Casaubon  is  likely 
to  be  at  home.  " 

"  He  goes  to  read  in  the  Library  of  the  Vatican 
every  day,  and  you  can  hardly  see  him  except  by 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  283 

an  appointment.  Especially  now.  We  are  about 
to  leave  Home,  and  he  is  very  busy.  He  is  usually 
away  almost  from  breakfast  till  dinner.  But  I 
am  sure  he  will  wish  you  to  dine  with  us. " 

Will  Ladislaw  was  struck  mute  for  a  few 
moments.  He  had  never  been  fond  of  Mr.  Casau- 
bon,  and  if  it  had  not  been  for  the  sense  of  obliga- 
tion, would  have  laughed  at  him  as  a  Bat  of 
erudition.  But  the  idea  of  this  dried-up  pedant, 
this  elaborator  of  small  explanations  about  as 
important  as  the  surplus  stock  of  false  antiquities 
kept  in  a  vendor's  back  chamber,  having  first  got 
this  adorable  young  creature  to  marry  him,  and 
then  passing  his  honeymoon  away  from  her,  grop- 
ing after  his  mouldy  futilities  (Will  was  given  to 
hyperbole),  —  this  sudden  picture  stirred  him  with 
a  sort  of  comic  disgust :  he  was  divided  between 
the  impulse  to  laugh  aloud  and  the  equally  unsea- 
sonable impulse  to  burst  into  scornful  invective. 
For  an  instant  he  felt  that  the  struggle  was  causing 
a  queer  contortion  of  his  mobile  features,  but  with 
a  good  effort  he  resolved  it  into  nothing  more 
offensive  than  a  merry  smile. 

Dorothea  wondered ;  but  the  smile  was  irresis- 
tible, and  shone  back  from  her  face  too.  Will 
Ladislaw 's  smile  was  delightful,  unless  you  were 
angry  with  him  beforehand :  it  was  a  gush  of 
inward  light  illuminating  the  transparent  skin  as 
well  as  the  eyes,  and  playing  about  every  curve  and 
line  as  if  some  Ariel  were  touching  them  with  a 
new  charm,  and  banishing  forever  the  traces  of 
moodiness.  The  reflection  of  that  smile  could  not 
but  have  a  little  merriment  in  it  too,  even  under 
dark  eyelashes  still  moist,  as  Dorothea  said  inquir- 
ingly,  "  Something  amuses  you  ?  " 


284  MlDpLEMARCH. 

"  Yes, "  said  Will,  quick  in  finding  resources. 
"  I  am  thinking  of  the  sort  of  figure  I  cut  the  first 
time  I  saw  you,  when  you  annihilated  my  poor 
sketch  with  your  criticism. " 

"  My  criticism  ? "  said  Dorothea,  wondering 
still  more.  "  Surely  not.  I  always  feel  particu- 
larly ignorant  about  painting. " 

"  I  suspected  you  of  knowing  so  much,  that 
you  knew  how  to  say  just  what  was  most  cut- 
ting. You  said  —  I  dare  say  you  don't  remem- 
ber it  as  I  do  —  that  the  relation  of  my  sketch 
to  nature  was  quite  hidden  from  you.  At  least, 
you  implied  that.  "  Will  could  laugh  now  as  well 
as  smile. 

"  That  was  really  my  ignorance, "  said  Dorothea, 
admiring  Will's  good-humour.  "  I  must  have  said 
so  only  because  I  never  could  see  any  beauty  in 
the  pictures  which  my  uncle  told  me  all  judges 
thought  very  fine.  And  I  have  gone  about  with 
just  the  same  ignorance  in  Eome.  There  are  com- 
paratively few  paintings  that  I  can  really  enjoy. 
At  first  when  I  enter  a  room  where  the  walls  are 
covered  with  frescos  or  with  rare  pictures,  I  feel 
a  kind  of  awe,  —  like  a  child  present  at  great  cere- 
monies where  there  are  grand  robes  and  processions ; 
I  feel  myself  in  the  presence  of  some  higher  life 
than  my  own.  But  when  I  begin  to  examine  the 
pictures  one  by  one,  the  life  goes  out  of  them,  or 
else  is  something  violent  and  strange  to  me.  It 
must  be  my  own  dulness.  I  am  seeing  so  much  all 
at  once,  and  not  understanding  half  of  it.  That 
always  makes  one  feel  stupid.  It  is  painful  to  be 
told  that  anything  is  very  fine  and  not  be  able  to 
feel  that  it  is  fine,  —  something  like  being  blind, 
while  people  talk  of  the  sky.  " 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  285 

"  Oh,  there  is  a  great  deal  in  the  feeling  for  art 
which  must  be  acquired, "  said  Will.  (It  was 
impossible  now  to  doubt  the  directness  of  Doro- 
thea's confession.)  "Art  is  an  old  language  with 
a  great  many  artificial  affected  styles,  and  some- 
times the  chief  pleasure  one  gets  out  of  knowing 
them  is  the  mere  sense  of  knowing.  I  enjoy  the 
art  of  all  sorts  here  immensely ;  but  I  suppose  if 
I  could  pick  my  enjoyment  to  pieces  I  should 
find  it  made  up  of  many  different  threads.  There 
is  something  in  daubing  a  little  one's  self,  and 
having  an  idea  of  the  process. " 

"  You  mean  perhaps  to  be  a  painter  ? "  said 
Dorothea,  with  a  new  direction  of  interest.  "  You 
mean  to  make  painting  your  profession  ?  Mr. 
Casaubon  will  like  to  hear  that  you  have  chosen 
a  profession. " 

"  No,  oh,  no, "  said  Will,  with  some  coldness. 
"  I  have  quite  made  up  my  mind  against  it.  It 
is  too  one-sided  a  life.  I  have  been  seeing  a  great 
deal  of  the  German  artists  here :  I  travelled  from 
Frankfort  with  one  of  them.  Some  are  fine,  even 
brilliant  fellows,  — but  I  should  not  like  to  get 
into  their  way  of  looking  at  the  world  entirely 
from  the  studio  point  of  view. " 

"  That  I  can  understand, "  said  Dorothea,  cor- 
dially. "  And  in  Kome  it  seems  as  if  there  were  so 
many  things  which  are  more  wanted  in  the  world 
than  pictures.  But  if  you  have  a  genius  for 
painting,  would  it  not  be  right  tc  take  that  as 
a  guide  ?  Perhaps  you  might  do  better  things 
than  these,  —  or  different,  so  that  there  might 
not  be  so  many  pictures  almost  all  alike  in  the 
same  place. " 

There  was  no   mistaking   this   simplicity,    and 


286  MIDDLEMAUCH. 

Will  was  won  by  it  into  frankness.  "  A  man  must 
have  a  very  rare  genius  to  make  changes  of  that 
sort.  I  am  afraid  mine  would  not  carry  me  even 
to  the  pitch  of  doing  well  what  has  been  done 
already,  at  least  not  so  well  as  to  make  it  worth 
while.  And  I  should  never  succeed  in  anything 
by  dint  of  drudgery.  If  things  don't  corne  easily 
to  me,  I  never  get  them.  " 

"  I  have  heard  Mr.  Casaubon  say  that  he  regrets 
your  want  of  patience,"  said  Dorothea,  gently. 
She  was  rather  shocked  at  this  mode  of  taking  all 
life  as  a  holiday. 

"  Yes,  I  know  Mr.  Casaubon 's  opinion.  He  and 
I  differ.  * 

The  slight  streak  of  contempt  in  this  hasty  reply 
offended  Dorothea.  She  was  all  the  more  suscep- 
tible about  Mr.  Casaubon  because  of  her  morning's 
trouble. 

"  Certainly  you  differ, "  she  said,  rather  proudly. 
"  I  did  not  think  of  comparing  you  :  such  power  of 
persevering  devoted  labour  as  Mr.  Casaubon 's  is 
not  common. " 

Will  saw  that  she  was  offended,  but  this  only 
gave  an  additional  impulse  to  the  new  irritation  of 
his  latent  dislike  towards  Mr.  Casaubon.  It  was 
too  intolerable  that  Dorothea  should  be  worship- 
ping this  husband :  such  weakness  in  a  woman  is 
pleasant  to  no  man  but  the  husband  in  question. 
Mortals  are  easily  tempted  to  pinch  the  life  out 
of  their  neighbour's  buzzing  glory,  and  think  that 
such  killing  is  no  murder. 

"  No,  indeed, "  he  answered  promptly.  "  And 
therefore  it  is  a  pity  that  it  should  be  thrown 
away,  as  so  much  English  scholarship  is,  for  want 
of  knowing  what  is  being  done  by  the  rest  of  the 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  287 

world.  If  Mr.  Casaubon  read  German,  he  would 
save  himself  a  great  deal  of  trouble.  " 

"  I  do  not  understand  you, "  said  Dorothea, 
startled  and  anxious. 

"  I  merely  mean, "  said  Will,  in  an  offhand  way, 
"  that  the  Germans,  have  taken  the  lead  in  histori- 
cal inquiries,  and  they  laugh  at  results  which  are 
got  by  groping  about  in  woods  with  a  pocket- 
compass  while  they  have  made  good  roads.  When 
I  was  with  Mr.  Casaubon,  I  saw  that  he  deafened 
himself  in  that  direction :  it  was  almost  against 
his  will  that  he  read  a  Latin  treatise  written  by  a 
German.  I  was  very  sorry.  " 

Will  only  thought  of  giving  a  good  pinch  that 
would  annihilate  that  vaunted  laboriousness,  and 
was  unable  to  imagine  the  mode  in  which  Doro- 
thea would  be  wounded.  Young  Mr.  Ladislaw 
was  not  at  all  deep  himself  in  German  writers  ;  but 
very  little  achievement  is  required  in  order  to  pity 
another  man's  shortcomings. 

Poor  Dorothea  felt  a  pang  at  the  thought  that 
the  labour  of  her  husband's  life  might  be  void, 
which  left  her  no  energy  to  spare  for  the  question 
whether  this  young  relative  who  was  so  much 
obliged  to  him  ought  not  to  have  repressed  his 
observation.  She  did  not  even  speak,  but  sat 
looking  at  her  hands,  absorbed  in  the  piteousness 
of  that  thought. 

Will,  however,  having  given  that  annihilating 
pinch,  was  rather  ashamed,  imagining  from  Doro- 
thea's silence  that  he  had  offended  her  still  more; 
and  having  also  a  conscience  about  plucking  the 
tail-feathers  from  a  benefactor. 

"  I  regretted  it  especially, "  he  resumed,  taking 
the  usual  course  from  detraction  to  insincere 


288  MIDDLEMARCH. 

eulogy,  "  because  of  my  gratitude  and  respect 
towards  my  cousin.  It  would  not  signify  so  much 
in  a  man  whose  talents  and  character  were  less 
distinguished. " 

Dorothea  raised  her  eyes,  brighter  than  usual 
with  excited  feeling,  and  said  in  her  saddest  recita- 
tive :  "  How  I  wish  I  had  learned  German  when  I 
was  at  Lausanne!  There  were  plenty  of  German 
teachers.  But  now  I  can  be  of  no  use. " 

There  was  a  new  light,  but  still  a  mysterious 
light,  for  Will  in  Dorothea's  last  words.  The 
question  how  she  had  come  to  accept  Mr.  Casaubon 
—  which  he  had  dismissed  when  he  first  saw  her  by 
saying  that  she  must  be  disagreeable  in  spite  of 
appearances  —  was  not  now  to  be  answered  on  any 
such  short  and  easy  method.  Whatever  else  she 
might  be,  she  was  not  disagreeable.  She  was  not 
coldly  clever  and  indirectly  satirical,  but  adorably 
simple  and  full  of  feeling.  She  was  an  angel 
beguiled.  It  would  be  a  unique  delight  to  wait 
and  watch  for  the  melodious  fragments  in  which 
her  heart  and  soul  came  forth  so  directly  and 
ingenuously.  The  ^Eolian  harp  again  came  into 
his  mind. 

She  must  have  made  some  original  romance  for 
herself  in  this  marriage.  And  if  Mr.  Casaubon 
had  been  a  dragon  who  had  carried  her  off  to  his 
lair  with  his  talons  simply  and  without  legal 
forms,  it  would  have  been  an  unavoidable  feat  of 
heroism  to  release  her  and  fall  at  her  feet.  But  he 
was  something  more  unmanageable  than  a  dragon : 
he  was  a  benefactor  with  collective  society  at  his 
back,  and  he  was  at  that  moment  entering  the 
room  in  all  the  unimpeachable  correctness  of  his 
demeanour,  while  Dorothea  was  looking  animated 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  289 

with  a  newly  roused  alarm  and  regret,  and  Will 
was  looking  animated  with  his  admiring  specula- 
tion about  her  feelings. 

Mr.  Casaubon  felt  a  surprise  which  was  quite 
unmixed  with  pleasure,  but  he  did  not  swerve 
from  his  usual  politeness  of  greeting,  when  Will 
rose  and  explained  his  presence.  Mr.  Casaubon 
was  less  happy  than  usual,  and  this  perhaps  made 
him  look  all  the  dimmer  and  more  faded ;  else  the 
effect  might  easily  have  been  produced  by  the  con- 
trast of  his  young  cousin's  appearance.  The  first 
impression  on  seeing  Will  was  one  of  sunny  bright- 
ness, which  added  to  the  uncertainty  of  his  chang- 
ing expression.  Surely,  his  very  features  changed 
their  form ;  his  jaw  looked  sometimes  large  and 
sometimes  small ;  and  the  little  ripple  in  his  nose 
was  a  preparation  for  metamorphosis.  When  he 
turned  his  head  quickly,  his  hair  seemed  to  shake 
out  light,  and  some  persons  thought  they  saw 
decided  genius  in  this  coruscation.  Mr.  Casau- 
bon, on  the  contrary,  stood  rayless. 

As  Dorothea's  eyes  were  turned  anxiously  on  her 
husband,  she  was  perhaps  not  insensible  to  the  con- 
trast, but  it  was  only  mingled  with  other  causes  in 
making  her  more  conscious  of  that  new  alarm  on 
his  behalf  which  was  the  first  stirring  of  a  pitying 
tenderness  fed  by  the  realities  of  his  lot  and  not 
by  her  own  dreams.  Yet  it  was  a  source  of 
greater  freedom  to  her  that  Will  was  there ;  his 
young  equality  was  agreeable,  and  also  perhaps  his 
openness  to  conviction.  She  felt  an  immense  need 
of  some  one  to  speak  to,  and  she  had  never  before 
seen  any  one  who  seemed  so  quick  and  pliable, 
so  likely  to  understand  everything. 

Mr.    Casaubon    gravely   hoped   that   Will    was 

VOL.  1.  —  19 


290  MIDDLEMARCH. 

passing  his  time  profitably  as  well  as  pleasantly  in 
Rome,  — had  thought  his  intention  was  to  remain 
in  South  Germany,  — but  begged  him  to  come  and 
dine  to-morrow,  when  he  could  converse  more  at 
large :  at  present  he  was  somewhat  weary.  Lad- 
islaw  understood,  and  accepting  the  invitation 
immediately  took  his  leave. 

Dorothea's  eyes  followed  her  husband  anxiously, 
while  he  sank  down  wearily  at  the  end  of  a  sofa, 
and  resting  his  elbow,  supported  his  head  and 
looked  on  the  floor.  A  little  flushed  and  with 
bright  eyes,  she  seated  herself  beside  him,  and 
said,  — 

"  Forgive  me  for  speaking  so  hastily  to  you  this 
morning.  I  was  wrong.  I  fear  I  hurt  you,  and 
made  the  day  more  burdensome. " 

"  I  am  glad  that  you  feel  that,  my  dear, "  said 
Mr.  Casaubon.  He  spoke  quietly  and  bowed  his 
head  a  little,  but  there  was  still  an  uneasy  feeling 
in  his  eyes  as  he  looked  at  her. 

"  But  you  do  forgive  me  ? "  said  Dorothea,  with 
a  quick  sob.  In  her  need  for  some  manifestation 
of  feeling  she  was  ready  to  exaggerate  her  own 
fault.  Would  not  love  see  returning  penitence 
afar  off,  and  fall  on  its  neck  and  kiss  it  ? 

"  My  dear  Dorothea,  — '  who  with  repentance  is 
not  satisfied,  is  not  of  heaven  nor  earth : '  you 
do  not  think  me  worthy  to  be  banished  by  that 
severe  sentence,"  said  Mr.  Casaubon,  exerting 
himself  to  make  a  strong  statement,  and  also  to 
smile  faintly. 

Dorothea  was  silent,  but  a  tear  which  had  come 
up  with  the  sob  would  insist  on  falling. 

"  You  are  excited,  my  dear.  And  I  also  am 
feeling  some  unpleasant  consequences  of  too  much 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  291 

mental  disturbance, "  said  Mr.  Casaubon.  In  fact, 
he  had  it  in  his  thought  to  tell  her  that  she  ought 
not  to  have  received  young  Ladislaw  in  his 
absence ;  but  he  abstained,  partly  from  the  sense 
that  it  would  be  ungracious  to  bring  a  new  com- 
plaint in  the  moment  of  her  penitent  acknowledg- 
ment, partly  because  he  wanted  to  avoid  further 
agitation  of  himself  by  speech,  and  partly  because 
he  was  too  proud  to  betray  that  jealousy  of  dispo- 
sition which  was  not  so  exhausted  on  his  scholarly 
compeers  that  there  was  none  to  spare  in  other 
directions.  There  is  a  sort  of  jealousy  which 
needs  very  little  fire :  it  is  hardly  a  passion,  but 
a  blight  bred  in  the  cloudy,  damp  despondency  of 
uneasy  egoism. 

"  I  think  it  is  time  for  us  to  dress, "  he  added, 
looking  at  his  watch.  They  both  rose,  and  there 
was  never  any  further  allusion  between  them  to 
what  had  passed  on  this  day. 

But  Dorothea  remembered  it  to  the  last  with  the 
vividness  with  which  we  all  remember  epochs  in 
our  experience  when  some  dear  expectation  dies, 
or  some  new  motive  is  born.  To-day  she  had 
begun  to  see  that  she  had  been  under  a  wild  illu- 
sion in  expecting  a  response  to  her  feeling  from 
Mr.  Casaubon,  and  she  had  felt  the  waking  of  a 
presentiment  that  there  might  be  a  sad  conscious- 
ness in  his  life  which  made  as  great  a  need  on  his 
side  as  on  her  own. 

We  are  all  of  us  born  in  moral  stupidity,  taking 
the  world  as  an  udder  to  feed  our  supreme  selves : 
Dorothea  had  early  begun  to  emerge  from  that 
stupidity,  but  yet  it  had  been  easier  to  her  to 
imagine  how  she  would  devote  herself  to  Mr. 
Casaubon,  and  become  wise  and  strong  in  his 


292  MIDDLEMARCH. 

strength  and  wisdom,  than  to  conceive  with  that 
distinctness  which  is  no  longer  reflection  but  feel- 
ing, —  an  idea  wrought  back  to  the  directness  of 
sense,  like  the  solidity  of  objects,  —  that  he  had 
an  equivalent  centre  of  self,  whence  the  lights  and 
shadows  must  always  fall  with  a  certain  difference. 


CHAPTEE   XXII. 

Nons  causames  longtemps ;  elle  etait  simple  et  bonne 
Ne  sachant  pas  le  mal,  elle  faisait  le  bien ; 
Des  richesses  du  cceur  elle  me  fit  1'aumone, 
Et  tout  en  ecoutant  comme  le  cosur  se  donne, 
Sans  oser  y  penser,  je  lui  donnai  le  mien ; 
Elle  emporta  ma  vie,  et  n'en  sut  jamais  rien. 

ALFKED  DB  MUSSET. 

WILL  LADISLAW  was  delightfully  agreeable  at 
dinner  the  next  day,  and  gave  no  opportunity  for 
Mr.  Casaubon  to  show  disapprobation.  On  the  con- 
trary it  seemed  to  Dorothea  that  Will  had  a  hap- 
pier way  of  drawing  her  husband  into  conversation 
and  of  deferentially  listening  to  him  than  she  had 
ever  observed  in  any  one  before.  To  be  sure, 
the  listeners  about  Tipton  were  not  highly  gifted ! 
Will  talked  a  good  deal  himself,  but  what  he  said 
was  thrown  in  with  such  rapidity,  and  with  such 
an  unimportant  air  of  saying  something  by  the 
way,  that  it  seemed  a  gay  little  chime  after  the 
great  bell.  If  Will  was  not  always  perfect,  this 
was  certainly  one  of  his  good  days.  He  described 
touches  of  incident  among  the  poor  people  in 
Eome,  only  to  be  seen  by  one  who  could  move 
about  freely ;  he  found  himself  in  agreement  with 
Mr.  Casaubon  as  to  the  unsound  opinions  of  Mid- 
dleton  concerning  the  relations  of  Judaism  and 
Catholicism ;  and  passed  easily  to  a  half-enthu- 
siastic, half-playful  picture  of  the  enjoyment  he 
got  out  of  the  very  miscellaneousness  of  Eome, 
which  made  the  mind  flexible  with  constant  com- 


294  MIDDLEMARCH. 

parison,  and  saved  you  from  seeing  the  world's 
ages  as  a  set  of  box-like  partitions  without  vital 
connection.  Mr.  Casaubon's  studies,  Will  ob- 
served, had  always  been  of  too  broad  a  kind  for 
that,  and  he  had  perhaps  never  felt  any  such 
sudden  effect,  but  for  himself  he  confessed  that 
Home  had  given  him  quite  a  new  sense  of  history 
as  a  whole  :  the  fragments  stimulated  his  imagina- 
tion and  made  him  constructive.  Then  occasion- 
ally, but  not  too  often,  he  appealed  to  Dorothea, 
and  discussed  what  she  said,  as  if  her  sentiment 
were  an  item  to  be  considered  in  the  final  judgment 
even  of  the  Madonna  di  Foligno  or  the  Laocoon. 
A  sense  of  contributing  to  form  the  world's  opinion 
makes  conversation  particularly  cheerful;  and  Mr. 
Casaubon  too  was  not  without  his  pride  in  his 
young  wife,  who  spoke  better  than  most  women, 
as  indeed  he  had  perceived  in  choosing  her. 

Since  things  were  going  on  so  pleasantly,  Mr. 
Casaubon's  statement  that  his  labours  in  the  Li- 
brary would  be  suspended  for  a  couple  of  days,  and 
that  after  a  brief  renewal  he  should  have  no  further 
reason  for  staying  in  Eome,  encouraged  Will  to 
urge  that  Mrs.  Casaubon  should  not  go  away  with- 
out seeing  a  studio  or  two.  Would  not  Mr.  Casau- 
bon take  her  ?  That  sort  of  thing  ought  not  to  be 
missed :  it  was  quite  special :  it  was  a  form  of  life 
that  grew  like  a  small  fresh  vegetation  with  its 
population  of  insects  on  huge  fossils.  Will  would 
be  happy  to  conduct  them,  —  not  to  anything 
wearisome,  only  to  a  few  examples. 

Mr.  Casaubon,  seeing  Dorothea  look  earnestly 
towards  him,  could  not  but  ask  her  if  she  would 
be  interested  in  such  visits :  he  was  now  at  her 
service  during  the  whole  day ;  and  it  was  agreed 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  295 

that  Will  should  come  on  the  morrow  and  drive 
with  them. 

Will  could  not  omit  Thorwaldsen,  a  living 
celebrity  about  whom  even  Mr.  Casaubon  inquired, 
but  before  the  day  was  far  advanced  he  led  the 
way  to  the  studio  of  his  friend  Adolf  Naumann, 
whom  he  mentioned  as  one  of  the  chief  renovators 
of  Christian  art,  one  of  those  who  had  not  only 
revived  but  expanded  that  grand  conception  of 
supreme  events  as  mysteries  at  which  the  succes- 
sive ages  were  spectators,  and  in  relation  to  which 
the  great  souls  of  all  periods  became  as  it  were 
contemporaries.  Will  added  that  he  had  made 
himself  Naumann 's  pupil  for  the  nonce. 

"  I  have  been  making  some  oil-sketches  under 
him, "  said  Will.  "  I  hate  copying.  I  must  put 
something  of  my  own  in.  Naumann  has  been 
painting  the  Saints  drawing  the  Car  of  the  Church, 
and  I  have  been  making  a  sketch  of  Marlowe's 
Tamburlaine  Driving  the  Conquered  Kings  in  his 
Chariot.  I  am  not  so  ecclesiastical  as  Naumann, 
and  I  sometimes  twit  him  with  his  excess  of  mean- 
ing. But  this  time  I  mean  to  outdo  him  in 
breadth  of  intention.  I  take  Tamburlaine  in  his 
chariot  for  the  tremendous  course  of  the  world's 
physical  history  lashing  on  the  harnessed  dynas- 
ties. In  my  opinion,  that  is  a  good  mythical  in- 
terpretation. "  Will  here  looked  at  Mr.  Casaubon, 
who  received  this  offhand  treatment  of  symbolism 
Very  uneasily,  and  bowed  with  a  neutral  air. 

"  The  sketch  must  be  very  grand,  if  it  conveys 
so  much, "  said  Dorothea.  "  I  should  need  some 
explanation  even  of  the  meaning  you  give.  Do 
you  intend  Tamburlaine  to  represent  earthquakes 
and  volcanoes  ?  " 


296  MIDDLEMA.RCH. 

/ 

"Oh,  yes,"  said  Will,  laughing,  "and  migra- 
tions of  races  and  clearings  of  forests  —  and  Amer- 
ica, and  the  steam-engine.  Everything  you  can 
imagine ! " 

"  What  a  difficult  kind  of  shorthand !  "  said 
Dorothea,  smiling  towards  her  husband.  "  It 
would  require  all  your  knowledge  to  be  able  to 
read  it. " 

Mr.  Casaubon  blinked  furtively  at  Will.  He 
had  a  suspicion  that  he  was  being  laughed  at. 
But  it  was  not  possible  to  include  Dorothea  in  the 
suspicion. 

They  found  Naumann  painting  industriously, 
but  no  model  was  present ;  his  pictures  were  advan- 
tageously arranged,  and  his  own  plain  vivacious 
person  set  off  by  a  dove-coloured  blouse  and  a 
maroon  velvet  cap,  so  that  everything  was  as  for- 
tunate as  if  he  had  expected  the  beautiful  young 
English  lady  exactly  at  that  time. 

The  painter  in  his  confident  English  gave  little 
dissertations  on  his  finished  and  unfinished  sub- 
jects, seeming  to  observe  Mr.  Casaubon  as  much 
as  he  did  Dorothea.  Will  burst  in  here  and  there 
with  ardent  words  of  praise,  marking  out  particu- 
lar merits  in  his  friend's  work;  and  Dorothea  felt 
that  she  was  getting  quite  new  notions  as  to  the 
significance  of  Madonnas  seated  under  inexplicable 
canopied  thrones  with  the  simple  country  as  a 
background,  and  of  saints  with  architectural 
models  in  their  hands,  or  knives  accidentally 
wedged  in  their  skulls.  Some  things  which  had 
seemed  monstrous  to  her  were  gathering  intelligi- 
bility and  even  a  natural  meaning;  but  all  this 
was  apparently  a  branch  of  knowledge  in  which 
Mr.  Casaubou  had  not  interested  himself. 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  297 

0  I  think  I  would  rather  feel  that  painting  is 
beautiful  than  have  to  read  it  as  an  enigma ;  but 
I  should  learn  to  understand  these  pictures  sooner 
than  yours  with  the  very  wide  meaning,"  said 
Dorothea,  speaking  to  Will. 

"  Don't  speak  of  my  painting  before  Naumann, " 
said  Will.  "  He  will  tell  you,  it  is  all  pfuscherei, 
which  is  his  most  opprobrious  word !  " 

"  Is  that  true  ?  "  said  Dorothea,  turning  her 
sincere  eyes  on  Naumann,  who  made  a  slight  gri- 
mace and  said,  — 

"  Oh,  he  does  not  mean  it  seriously  with  paint- 
ing. His  walk  must  be  belles-lettres.  That  is 
wi-ide.  " 

Naumann 's  pronunciation  of  the  vowel  seemed 
to  stretch  the  word  satirically.  Will  did  not  half 
like  it,  but  managed  to  laugh ;  and  Mr.  Casaubon, 
while  he  felt  some  disgust  at  the  artist's  German 
accent,  began  to  entertain  a  little  respect  for  his 
judicious  severity. 

The  respect  was  not  diminished  when  Naumann, 
after  drawing  Will  aside  for  a  moment  and  looking 
first  at  a  large  canvas,  then  at  Mr.  Casaubon,  came 
forward  again  and  said,  — 

"  My  friend  Ladislaw  thinks  you  will  pardon 
me,  sir,  if  I  say  that  a  sketch  of  your  head  would 
be  invaluable  to  me  for  the  St.  Thomas  Aquinas  in 
my  picture  there.  It  is  too  much  to  ask ;  but  I 
so  seldom  see  just  what  I  want,  —  the  idealistic  in 
the  real. " 

"  You  astonish  me  greatly,  sir, "  said  Mr.  Casau- 
bon, his  looks  improved  with  a  glow  of  delight; 
"  but  if  my  poor  physiognomy,  which  I  have  been 
accustomed  to  regard  as  of  the  commonest  order, 
can  be  of  any  use  to  you  in  furnishing  some  traits 


298  MIDDLEMARCH. 

for  the  angelical  doctor,  I  shall  feel  honoured. 
That  is  to  say,  if  the  operation  will  not  be  a 
lengthy  one;  and  if  Mrs.  Casaubon  will  not  objact 
to  the  delay. " 

As  for  Dorothea,  nothing  could  have  pleased  her 
more,  unless  it  had  been  a  miraculous  voice  pro- 
nouncing Mr.  Casaubon  the  wisest  and  worthiest 
among  the  sons  of  men.  In  that  case  her  tottering 
faith  would  have  become  firm  again. 

Naumann's  apparatus  was  at  hand  in  wonderful 
completeness,  and  the  sketch  went  on  at  once  as 
well  as  the  conversation.  Dorothea  sat  down  and 
subsided  into  calm  silence,  feeling  happier  than 
she  had  done  for  a  long  while  before.  Every  one 
about  her  seemed  good,  and  she  said  to  herself  that 
Eome,  if  she  had  only  been  less  ignorant,  would 
have  been  full  of  beauty :  its  sadness  would  have 
been  winged  with  hope.  No  nature  could  be  less 
suspicious  than  hers :  when  she  was  a  child  she 
believed  in  the  gratitude  of  wasps  and  the  honour- 
able susceptibility  of  sparrows,  and  was  proportion- 
ately indignant  when  their  baseness  was  made 
manifest. 

The  adroit  artist  was  asking  Mr.  Casaubon  ques- 
tions about  English  politics,  which  brought  long 
answers,  and  Will  meanwhile  had  perched  himself 
on  some  steps  in  the  background  overlooking  all. 

Presently  Naumann  said,  "  Now  if  I  could  lay 
this  by  for  half  an  hour  and  take  it  up  again  — 
come  and  look,  Ladislaw  —  I  think  it  is  perfect  so 
far. " 

Will  vented  those  adjuring  interjections  which 
imply  that  admiration  is  too  strong  for  syntax; 
and  Naumann  said  in  a  tone  of  piteous  regret,  — 

"Ah  —  now  —  if  I  could  but  have  had  more  — 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  299 

but  you  have  other  engagements  —  I  could  not  ask 
it  —  or  even  to  come  again  to-morrow.  " 

"  Oh,  let  us  stay ! "  said  Dorothea.  "  We  have 
nothing  to  do  to-day  except  go  about,  have  we  ? " 
she  added,  looking  entreatingly  at  Mr.  Casaubon. 
"  It  would  be  a  pity  not  to  make  the  head  as  good 
as  possible. " 

"  I  am  at  your  service,  sir,  in  the  matter, "  said 
Mr.  Casaubon,  with  polite  condescension.  "  Hav- 
ing given  up  the  interior  of  my  head  to  idleness, 
it  is  as  well  that  the  exterior  should  work  in  this 
way." 

"  You  are  unspeakably  good,  —  now  I  am 
happy !  "  said  Naumann,  and  then  went  on  in  Ger- 
man to  Will,  pointing  here  and  there  to  the  sketch 
as  if  he  were  considering  that.  Putting  it  aside 
for  a  moment,  he  looked  round  vaguely,  as  if  seek- 
ing some  occupation  for  his  visitors,  and  after- 
wards turning  to  Mr.  Casaubon,  said,  — 

"  Perhaps  the  beautiful  bride,  the  gracious  lady, 
would  not  be  unwilling  to  let  me  fill  up  the  time 
by  trying  to  make  a  slight  sketch  of  her  —  not, 
of  course,  as  you  see,  for  that  picture  —  only  as  a 
single  study. " 

Mr.  Casaubon,  bowing,  doubted  not  that  Mrs. 
Casaubon  would  oblige  him,  and  Dorothea  said 
at  once,  "  Where  shall  I  put  myself  ?  " 

Naumann  was  all  apologies  in  asking  her  to 
stand,  and  allow  him  to  adjust  her  attitude,  to 
which  she  submitted  without  any  of  the  affected 
airs  and  laughs  frequently  thought  necessary  on 
such  occasions,  when  the  painter  said,  *  It  is  as 
Santa  Clara  that  I  want  you  to  stand,  —  leaning  so, 
with  your  cheek  against  your  hand  —  so  —  looking 
at  that  stool,  please,  so !  " 


300  MIDDLEMARCH. 

Will  was  divided  between  the  inclination  to  fall 
at  the  Saint's  feet  and  kiss  her  robe,  and  the 
temptation  to  knock  Naumann  down  while  he  was 
adjusting  her  arm.  All  this  was  impudence  and 
desecration,  and  he  repented  that  he  had  brought 
her. 

The  artist  was  diligent,  and  Will  recovering 
himself  moved  about  and  occupied  Mr.  Casaubon 
as  ingeniously  as  he  could;  but  he  did  not  in  the 
end  prevent  the  time  from  seeming  long  to  that 
gentleman,  as  was  clear  from  his  expressing  a  fear 
that  Mrs.  Casaubon  would  be  tired.  Naumann 
took  the  hint  and  said,  — 

"  Now,  sir,  if  you  can  oblige  me  again,  I  will 
release  the  lady-wife.  " 

So  Mr.  Casaubon 's  patience  held  out  further, 
and  when  after  all  it  turned  out  that  the  head  of 
Saint  Thomas  Aquinas  would  be  more  perfect  if 
another  sitting  could  be  had,  it  was  granted  for 
the  morrow.  On  the  morrow  Santa  Clara  too  was 
retouched  more  than  once.  The  result  of  all  was 
so  far  from  displeasing  to  Mr.  Casaubou  that  he 
arranged  for  the  purchase  of  the  picture  in  which 
Saint  Thomas  Aquinas  sat  among  the  doctors  of 
the  Church  in  a  disputation  too  abstract  to  be 
represented,  but  listened  to  with  more  or  less 
attention  by  an  audience  above.  The  Santa  Clara, 
which  was  spoken  of  in  the  second  place,  Naumann 
declared  himself  to  be  dissatisfied  with,  — he  could 
not,  in  conscience,  engage  to  make  a  worthy  pic- 
ture of  it ;  so  about  the  Santa  Clara  the  arrange- 
ment was  conditional. 

I  will  not  dwell  on  Naumann's  jokes  at  the 
expense  of  Mr.  Casaubon  that  evening,  or  on  his 
dithyrambs  about  Dorothea's  charm,  in  all  which 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  301 

Will  joined,  but  with  a  difference.  No  sooner 
did  Naumann  mention  any  detail  of  Dorothea's 
beauty,  than  Will  got  exasperated  at  his  presump- 
tion :  there  was  grossness  in  his  choice  of  the  most 
ordinary  words,  and  what  business  had  he  to  talk 
of  her  lips  ?  She  was  not  a  woman  to  be  spoken 
of  as  other  women  were.  Will  could  not  say  just 
what  he  thought,  but  he  became  irritable.  And 
yet,  when  after  some  resistance  he  had  consented 
to  take  the  Casaubons  to  his  friend's  studio,  he 
had  been  allured  by  the  gratification  of  his  pride 
in  being  the  person  who  could  grant  Naumann 
such  an  opportunity  of  studying  her  loveliness,  - 
or  rather  her  divineness,  for  the  ordinary  phrases 
which  might  apply  to  mere  bodily  prettiness  were 
not  applicable  to  her.  (Certainly  all  Tipton  and 
its  neighbourhood,  as  well  as  Dorothea  herself, 
would  have  been  surprised  at  her  beauty  being 
made  so  much  of.  In  that  part  of  the  world  Miss 
Brooke  had  been  only  a  "  fine  young  woman. ") 

"  Oblige  me  by  letting  the  subject  drop,  Nau- 
mann. Mrs.  Casaubon  is  not  to  be  talked  of  as  if 
she  were  a  model,"  said  Will.  Naumann  stared 
at  him. 

"  Schb'n !  I  will  talk  of  my  Aquinas.  The  head 
is  not  a  bad  type,  after  all.  I  dare  say  the  great 
scholastic  himself  would  have  been  flattered  to 
have  his  portrait  asked  for.  Nothing  like  these 
starchy  doctors  for  vanity  !  It  was  as  I  thought : 
he  cared  much  less  for  her  portrait  than  his 
own. " 

"  He 's  a  cursed  white-blooded  pedantic  cox- 
comb, "  said  Will,  with  gnashing  impetuosity. 
His  obligations  to  Mr.  Casaubon  were  not  known 
to  his  hearer,  but  Will  himself  was  thinking  of 


302  MIDDLEMAKCH. 

them,  and  wishing  that  he  could  discharge  them 
all  by  a  check. 

Naumann  gave  a  shrug  and  said :  "  It  is  good 
they  go  away  soon,  my  dear.  They  are  spoiling 
your  fine  temper. " 

All  Will's  hope  and  contrivance  were  now  con- 
centrated on  seeing  Dorothea  when  she  was  alone. 
He  only  wanted  her  to  take  more  emphatic  notice 
of  him ;  he  only  wanted  to  be  something  more 
special  in  her  remembrance  than  he  could  yet 
believe  himself  likely  to  be.  He  was  rather  impa- 
tient under  that  open  ardent  good-will  which  he 
saw  was  her  usual  state  of  feeling.  The  remote 
worship  of  a  woman  throned  out  of  their  reach 
plays  a  great  part  in  men's  lives,  but  in  most  cases 
the  worshipper  longs  for  some  queenly  recognition, 
some  approving  sign  by  which  his  soul's  sovereign 
may  cheer  him  without  descending  from  her  high 
place.  That  was  precisely  what  Will  wanted. 
But  there  were  plenty  of  contradictions  in  his 
imaginative  demands.  It  was  beautiful  to  see 
how  Dorothea's  eyes  turned  with  wifely  anxiety 
and  beseeching  to  Mr.  Casaubon :  she  would  have 
lost  some  of  her  halo  if  she  had  been  without  that 
duteous  preoccupation ;  and  yet  at  the  next  moment 
the  husband's  sandy  absorption  of  such  nectar  was 
too  intolerable;  and  Will's  longing  to  say  dam- 
aging things  about  him  was  perhaps  not  the  less 
tormenting  because  he  felt  the  strongest  reasons 
for  restraining  it. 

Will  had  not  been  invited  to  dine  the  next  day. 
Hence  he  persuaded  himself  that  he  was  bound  to 
call,  and  that  the  only  eligible  time  was  the 
middle  of  the  day,  when  Mr.  Oasaubon  would  not 
be  at  home. 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  303 

Dorothea,  who  had  not  been  made  aware  that 
her  former  reception  of  Will  had  displeased  her 
husband,  had  no  hesitation  about  seeing  him,  espe- 
cially as  he  might  be  come  to  pay  a  farewell  visit. 
When  he  entered  she  was  looking  at  some  cameos 
which  she  had  been  buying  for  Celia.  She  greeted 
Will  as  if  his  visit  were  quite  a  matter  of  course, 
and  said  at  once,  having  a  cameo  bracelet  in  her 
hand,  — 

"  I  am  so  glad  you  are  come.  Perhaps  you 
understand  all  about  cameos,  and  can  tell  me  if 
these  are  really  good.  I  wished  to,  have  you  with 
us  in  choosing  them,  but  Mr.  Casaubon  objected : 
he  thought  there  was  not  time.  He  will  finish 
his  work  to-morrow,  and  we  shall  go  away  in  three 
days.  I  have  been  uneasy  about  these  cameos. 
Pray  sit  down  and  look  at  them. " 

"  I  am  not  particularly  knowing,  but  there  can 
be  no  great  mistake  about  these  little  Homeric 
bits :  they  are  exquisitely  neat.  And  the  colour  is 
fine  :  it  will  just  suit  you.  " 

"  Oh,  they  are  for  my  sister,  who  has  quite  a 
different  complexion.  You  saw  her  with  me  at 
Lowick  :  she  is  light-haired  and  very  pretty, —  at 
least  I  think  so.  We  were  never  so  long  away 
from  each  other  in  our  lives  before.  She  is  a  great 
pet,  and  never  was  naughty  in  her  life.  I  found 
out  before  I  came  away  that  she  wanted  me  to 
buy  her  some  cameos,  and  I  should  be  sorry  for 
them  not  to  be  good  —  after  their  kind.  "  Dorothea 
added  the  last  words  with  a  smile. 

"  You  seem  not  to  care  about  cameos, "  said  Will, 
seating  himself  at  some  distance  from  her,  and 
observing  her  while  she  closed  the  cases. 

"  No,  frankly,  I  don't  think  them  a  great  object 
in  life, "  said  Dorothea. 


304  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  I  fear  you  are  a  heretic  about  art  generally. 
How  is  that?  I  should  have  expected  you  to  be 
very  sensitive  to  the  beautiful  everywhere. " 

"  I  suppose  I  am  dull  about  many  things,"  said 
Dorothea,  simply.  "  I  should  like  to  make  life 
beautiful, — I  mean  everybody's  life.  And  then 
all  this  immense  expense  of  art,  that  seems  some- 
how to  lie  outside  life  and  make  it  no  better  for 
the  world,  pains  one.  It  spoils  my  enjoyment  of 
anything  when  I  am  made  to  think  that  most 
people  are  shut  out  from  it. " 

"  I  call  that  the  fanaticism  of  sympathy, "  said 
Will,  impetuously.  "  You  might  say  the  same  of 
landscape,  of  poetry,  of  all  refinement.  If  you  car- 
ried it  out,  you  ought  to  be  miserable  in  your  own 
goodness,  and  turn  evil  that  you  might  have  no 
advantage  over  others.  The  best  piety  is  to  enjoy 
—  when  you  can.  You  are  doing  the  most  then  to 
save  the  earth's  character  as  an  agreeable  planet. 
An  enjoyment  radiates.  It  is  of  no  use  to  try  and 
take  care  of  all  the  world ;  that  is  being  taken 
care  of  when  you  feel  delight,  — in  art  or  in  any- 
thing else.  Would  you  turn  all  the  youth  of  the 
world  into  a  tragic  chorus,  wailing  and  moralizing 
over  misery  ?  I  suspect  that  you  have  some  false 
belief  in  the  virtues  of  misery,  and  want  to  make 
your  life  a  martyrdom. "  Will  had  gone  further 
than  he  intended,  and  checked  himself.  But 
Dorothea's  thought  was  not  taking  just  the  same 
direction  as  his  own,  and  she  answered  without 
any  special  emotion,  — 

"  Indeed  you  mistake  me.  I  am  not  a  sad, 
melancholy  creature.  I  am  never  unhappy  long 
together.  I  am  angry  and  naughty  —  not  like 
Celia:  I  have  a  great  outburst,  and  then  all  seems 
glorious  again.  I  cannot  help  believing  in  glorious 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  305 

things  in  a  blind  sort  of  way.  I  should  be  quite 
willing  to  enjoy  the  art  here,  but  there  is  so  much 
that  I  don't  know  the  reason  of, —  so  much  that 
seems  to  me  a  consecration  of  ugliness  rather  than 
beauty.  The  painting  and  sculpture  may  be  won- 
derful, but  the  feeling  is  often  low  and  brutal,  and 
sometimes  even  ridiculous.  Here  and  there  I  see 
what  takes  me  at  once  as  noble, —  something  that  I 
might  compare  with  the  Alban  Mountains  or  the 
sunset  from  the  Pincian  Hill ;  but  that  makes  it 
the  greater  pity  that  there  is  so  little  of  the  best 
kind  among  all  that  mass  of  things  over  which 
men  have  toiled  so. " 

"  Of  course  there  is  always  a  great  deal  of  poor 
work :  the  rarer  things  want  that  soil  to  grow  in. " 

"  Oh  dear, "  said  Dorothea,  taking  up  that 
thought  into  the  chief  current  of  her  anxiety ;  *  I 
see  it  must  be  very  difficult  to  do  anything  good. 
I  have  often  felt  since  I  have  been  in  Rome  that 
most  of  our  lives  would  look  much  uglier  and  more 
bungling  than  the  pictures,  if  they  could  be  put  on 
the  wall. " 

Dorothea  parted  her  lips  again  as  if  she  were 
going  to  say  more,  but  changed  her  mind  and 
paused. 

"  You  are  too  young  —  it  is  an  anachronism  for 
you  to  have  such  thoughts,  "said  Will,  energeti- 
cally, with  a  quick  shake  of  the  head  habitual  to 
him.  "  You  talk  as  if  you  had  never  known  any 
youth.  It  is  monstrous,  — as  if  you  had  had  a 
vision  of  Hades  in  your  childhood,  like  the  boy  in 
the  legend.  You  have  been  brought  up  in  some  of 
those  horrible  notions  that  choose  the  sweetest 
women  to  devour  —  like  Minotaurs.  And  now  you 
will  go  and  be  shut  up  in  that  stone  prison  at 

VOL.  i.  — 20 


306  MIDDLEMARCH. 

Lowick :  you  will  be  buried  alive.  It  makes 
me  savage  to  think  of  it!  I  would  rather  never 
have  seen  you  than  think  of  you  with  such  a 
prospect. " 

Will  again  feared  that  he  had  gone  too  far ;  but 
the  meaning  we  attach  to  words  depends  on  our 
feeling,  and  his  tone  of  angry  regret  had  so  much 
kindness  in  it  for  Dorothea's  heart,  which  had 
always  been  giving  out  ardour  and  had  never  been 
fed  with  much  from  the  living  beings  around  her, 
that  she  felt  a  new  sense  of  gratitude,  and  answered 
with  a  gentle  smile,  — 

"  It  is  very  good  of  you  to  be  anxious  about  me. 
It  is  because  you  did  not  like  Lowick  yourself: 
you  had  set  your  heart  on  another  kind  of  life. 
But  Lowick  is  my  chosen  home. " 

The  last  sentence  was  spoken  with  an  almost 
solemn  cadence,  and  Will  did  not  know  what  to 
say,  since  it  would  not  be  useful  for  him  to  embrace 
her  slippers,  and  tell  her  that  he  would  die  for  her : 
it  was  clear  that  she  required  nothing  of  the  sort ; 
and  they  were  both  silent  for  a  moment  or  two, 
when  Dorothea  began  again  with  an  air  of  saying 
at  last  what  had  been  in  her  mind  beforehand. 

"  I  wanted  to  ask  you  again  about  something  you 
said  the  other  day.  Perhaps  it  was  half  of  it  your 
lively  way  of  speaking :  I  notice  that  you  like  to 
put  things  strongly;  I  myself  often  exaggerate 
when  I  speak  hastily. " 

"  What  was  it?  "  said  Will,  observing  that  she 
spoke  with  a  timidity  quite  new  in  her.  "  I  have 
a  hyperbolical  tongue  :  it  catches  fire  as  it  goes.  I 
dare  say  I  shall  have  to  retract. " 

"  I  mean  what  you  said  about  the  necessity  of 
knowing  German  —  I  mean,  for  the  subjects  that 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  307 

Mr.  Casaubon  is  engaged  in.  I  have  been  thinking 
about  it ;  and  it  seems  to  me  that  with  Mr.  Casau- 
bon's  learning  he  must  have  before  him  the  same 
materials  as  German  scholars, — has  he  not?" 
Dorothea's  timidity  was  due  to  an  indistinct  con- 
sciousness that  she  was  in  the  strange  situation  of 
consulting  a  third  person  about  the  adequacy  of 
Mr.  Casaubon 's  learning. 

"  Not  exactly  the  same  materials, "  said  Will, 
thinking  that  he  would  be  duly  reserved.  *  He 
is  not  an  Orientalist,  you  know.  He  does  not 
profess  to  have  more  than  second-hand  knowledge 
there. " 

"  But  there  are  very  valuable  books  about  antiqui- 
ties which  were  written  a  long  while  ago  by  schol- 
ars who  knew  nothing  about  these  modern  things ; 
and  they  are  still  used.  Why  should  Mr.  Casau- 
bon's  not  be  valuable,  like  theirs  ?  "  said  Doro- 
thea, with  more  remonstrant  energy.  She  was 
impelled  to  have  the  argument  aloud,  which  she 
had  been  having  in  her  own  mind. 

"  That  depends  on  the  line  of  study  taken, " 
said  Will,  also  getting  a  tone  of  rejoinder.  "  The 
subject  Mr.  Casaubon  has  chosen  is  as  changing 
as  chemistry :  new  discoveries  are  constantly  mak- 
ing new  points  of  view.  Who  wants  a  system 
on  the  basis  of  the  four  elements,  or  a  book  to 
refute  Paracelsus  ?  Do  you  not  see  that  it  is  no 
use  now  to  be  crawling  a  little  way  after  men  of 
the  last  century  —  men  like  Bryant  —  and  correct- 
ing their  mistakes  ?  —  living  in  a  lumber-room  and 
furbishing  up  broken -legged  theories  about  Chus 
and  Mizraim  ?  " 

"  How  can  you  bear  to  speak  so  lightly  ?  "  said 
Dorothea,  with  a  look  between  sorrow  and  anger. 


3o8  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  If  it  were  as  you  say,  what  could  be  sadder  than 
so  much  ardent  labour  all  in  vain  ?  I  wonder  it 
does  not  affect  you  more  painfully,  if  you  really 
think  that  a  man  like  Mr.  Casaubon,  of  so  much 
goodness,  power,  and  learning,  should  in  any  way 
fail  in  what  has  been  the  labour  of  his  best  years. " 
She  was  beginning  to  be  shocked  that  she  had  got 
to  such  a  point  of  supposition,  and  indignant  with 
Will  for  having  led  her  to  it. 

"  You  questioned  me  about  the  matter  of  fact, 
not  of  feeling, "  said  Will.  "  But  if  you  wish  to 
punish  me  for  the  fact,  I  submit.  I  am  not  in  a 
position  to  express  my  feeling  toward  Mr.  Casau- 
bon :  it  would  be  at  best  a  pensioner's  eulogy." 

"  Pray  excuse  me,"  said  Dorothea,  colouring  deeply. 
"  I  am  aware,  as  you  say,  that  I  am  in  fault  in  hav- 
ing introduced  the  subject.  Indeed,  I  am  wrong  al- 
together. Failure  after  long  perseverance  is  much 
grander  than  never  to  have  a  striving  good  enough 
to  be  called  a  failure." 

"  I  quite  agree  with  you,"  said  Will,  determined 
to  change  the  situation,  —  "  so  much  so  that  I  have 
made  up  my  mind  not  to  run  that  risk  of  never 
attaining  a  failure.  Mr.  Casaubon's  generosity  has 
perhaps  been  dangerous  to  me,  and  I  mean  to  re- 
nounce the  liberty  it  has  given  me.  I  mean  to  go 
back  to  England  shortly  and  work  my  own  way,  — 
depend  on  nobody  else  than  myself." 

"That  is  fine,  —  I  respect  that  feeling,"  said  Doro- 
thea, with  returning  kindness.  "  But  Mr.  Casaubon, 
I  am  sure,  has  never  thought  of  anything  in  the 
matter  except  what  was  most  for  your  welfare." 

"  She  has  obstinacy  and  pride  enough  to  serve  in- 
stead of  love,  now  she  has  married  him,"  said  Will 
to  himself.  Aloud  he  said,  rising,  — 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  309 

"  I  shall  not  see  you  again." 

"  Oh,  stay  till  Mr.  Casaubon  comes,"  said  Doro- 
thea, earnestly.  "  I  am  so  glad  we  met  in  Rome. 
I  wanted  to  know  you." 

"  And  I  have  made  you  angry,"  said  Will.  "  I 
have  made  you  think  ill  of  me." 

"  Oh,  no.  My  sister  tells  me  I  am  always  angry 
with  people  who  do  not  say  just  what  I  like.  But 
I  hope  I  am  not  given  to  think  ill  of  them.  In  the 
end  I  am  usually  obliged  to  think  ill  of  myself,  for 
being  so  impatient." 

"  Still,  you  don't  like  me;  I  have  made  myself  an 
unpleasant  thought  to  you." 

"  Not  at  all,"  said  Dorothea,  with  the  most  open 
kindness.  "  I  like  you  very  much." 

Will  was  not  quite  contented,  thinking  that  he 
would  apparently  have  been  of  more  importance  if 
he  had  been  disliked.  He  said  nothing,  but  looked 
dull,  not  to  say  sulky. 

"  And  I  am  quite  interested  to  see  what  you  will 
do,"  Dorothea  went  on  cheerfully.  "I  believe  de- 
voutly in  a  natural  difference  of  vocation.  If  it 
were  not  for  that  belief,  I  suppose  I  should  be  very 
narrow,  —  there  are  so  many  things,  besides  paint- 
ing, that  I  am  quite  ignorant  of.  You  would  hardly 
believe  how  little  I  have  taken  in  of  music  and  liter- 
ature, which  you  know  so  much  of.  I  wonder  what 
your  vocation  will  turn  out  to  be :  perhaps  you  will 
be  a  poet  ? " 

"  That  depends.  To  be  a  poet  is  to  have  a  soul 
so  quick  to  discern  that  no  shade  of  quality  escapes 
it,  and  so  quick  to  feel  that  discernment  is  but  a 
hand  playing  with  finely  ordered  variety  on  the 
chords  of  emotion,  —  a  soul  in  which  knowledge 
passes  instantaneously  into  feeling,  and  feeling  flashes 


310  MIDDLEMARCH. 

back  as  a  new  organ  of  knowledge.  One  may  have 
that  condition  by  fits  only." 

"But  you  leave  out  the  poems,"  said  Dorothea. 
"  I  think  they  are  wanted  to  complete  the  poet.  I 
understand  what  you  mean  about  knowledge  pass- 
ing into  feeling,  for  that  seems  to  be  just  what  I 
experience.  But  I  am  sure  I  could  never  produce 
a  poem." 

"You  are  a  poem  —  and  that  is  to  be  the  best 
part  of  a  poet,  —  what  makes  up  the  poet's  con- 
sciousness in  his  best  moods,"  said  Will,  showing 
such  originality  as  we  all  share  with  the  morning 
and  the  spring-time  and  other  endless  renewals. 

"  I  am  very  glad  to  hear  it,"  said  Dorothea,  laugh- 
ing out  her  words  in  a  birdlike  modulation,  and 
looking  at  Will  with  playful  gratitude  in  her  eyes. 
"  What  very  kind  things  you  say  to  me  ! " 

"  I  wish  I  could  ever  do  anything  that  would  be 
what  you  call  kind,  —  that  I  could  ever  be  of  the 
slightest  service  to  you.  I  fear  I  shall  never  have 
the  opportunity."  Will  spoke  with  fervour. 

"Oh,  yes,"  said  Dorothea,  cordially.  "It  will 
come ;  and  I  shall  remember  how  well  you  wish 
me.  I  quite  hoped  that  we  should  be  friends  when 
I  first  saw  you  —  because  of  your  relationship  to 
Mr.  Casaubon."  There  was  a  certain  liquid  bright- 
ness in  her  eyes,  and  Will  was  conscious  that  his 
own  were  obeying  a  law  of  nature  and  filling  too. 
The  allusion  to  Mr.  Casaubon  would  have  spoiled 
all  if  anything  at  that  moment  could  have  spoiled 
the  subduing  power,  the  sweet  dignity,  of  her  noble 
unsuspicious  inexperience. 

"And  there  is  one  thing  even  now  that  you  can 
do,"  said  Dorothea,  rising  and  walking  a  little  way 
under  the  strength  of  a  recurring  impulse.  "  Prom' 


OLD  AND  YOUNG.  311 

ise  me  that  you  will  not  again,  to  any  one,  speak  of 
that  subject  —  I  mean  about  Mr.  Casaubon's  writ- 
ings —  I  mean  in  that  kind  of  way.  It  was  I  who 
led  to  it.  It  was  my  fault.  But  promise  me." 

She  had  returned  from  her  brief  pacing,  and  stood 
opposite  Will,  looking  gravely  at  him. 

"Certainly,  I  will  promise  you,"  said  Will,  red- 
dening however.  If  he  never  said  a  cutting  word 
about  Mr.  Casaubon  again  and  left  off  receiving 
favours  from  him,  it  would  clearly  be  permissible  to 
hate  him  the  more.  The  poet  must  know  how  to 
hate,  says  Goethe  ;  and  Will  was  at  least  ready  with 
that  accomplishment.  He  said  that  he  must  go 
now  without  waiting  for  Mr.  Casaubon,  whom  he 
would  come  to  take  leave  of  at  the  last  moment. 
Dorothea  gave  him  her  hand,  and  they  exchanged 
a  simple  "Good-by." 

But  going  out  of  the  porte  cochere  he  met  Mr. 
Casaubon ;  and  that  gentleman,  expressing  the  best 
wishes  for  his  cousin,  politely  waived  the  pleasure 
of  any  further  leave-taking  on  the  morrow,  which 
would  be  sufficiently  crowded  with  the  preparations 
for  departure. 

"  I  have  something  to  tell  you  about  our  cousin 
Mr.  Ladislaw,  which  I  think  will  heighten  your 
opinion  of  him,"  said  Dorothea  to  her  husband  in 
the  course  of  the  evening.  She  had  mentioned 
immediately  on  his  entering  that  Will  had  just  gone 
away,  and  would  come  again  ;  but  Mr.  Casaubon  had 
said,  "I  met  him  outside,  and  we  made  our  final 
adieux,  I  believe,"  saying  this  with  the  air  and  tone 
by  which  we  imply  that  any  subject,  whether  pri- 
vate or  public,  does  not  interest  us  enough  to  wish 
for  a  further  remark  upon  it.  So  Dorothea  had 
waited. 


312  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  Wliat  is  that,  my  love  ? "  said  Mr.  Casaubon  (he 
always  said  "  my  love "  when  his  manner  was  the 
coldest). 

"He  has  made  up  his  mind  to  leave  off  wander- 
ing at  once,  and  to  give  up  his  dependence  on  your 
generosity.  He  means  soon  to  go  back  to  England, 
and  work  his  own  way.  I  thought  you  would  con- 
sider that  a  good  sign,"  said  Dorothea,  with  an 
appealing  look  into  her  husband's  neutral  face. 

"  Did  he  mention  the  precise  order  of  occupation 
to  which  he  would  addict  himself  ? " 

"  No.  But  he  said  that  he  felt  the  danger  which 
lay  for  him  in  your  generosity.  Of  course  he  will 
write  to  you  about  it.  Do  you  not  think  better  of 
him  for  his  resolve  ? " 

"  I  shall  await  his  communication  on  the  subject," 
said  Mr.  Casaubon. 

"  I  told  him  I  was  sure  that  the  thing  you  con- 
sidered in  all  you  did  for  him  was  his  own  welfare. 
I  remembered  your  goodness  in  what  you  said  about 
him  when  I  first  saw  him  at  Lowick,"  said  Doro- 
thea, putting  her  hand  on  her  husband's. 

"  I  had  a  duty  towards  him,"  said  Mr.  Casaubon, 
laying  his  other  hand  on  Dorothea's  in  conscien- 
tious acceptance  of  her  caress,  but  with  a  glance 
which  he  could  not  hinder  from  being  uneasy. 
"The  young  man,  I  confess,  is  not  otherwise  an 
object  of  interest  to  me,  nor  need  we,  I  think,  dis- 
cuss his  future  course,  which  it  is  not  ours  to  deter- 
mine beyond  the  limits  which  I  have  sufficiently 
indicated." 

Dorothea  did  not  mention  Will  again. 


BOOK  m. 

WAITING  FOE  DEATH. 
CHAPTER  XXIII. 

" '  Your  horses  of  the  Sun,'  he  said, 

'  And  first-rate  whip  Apollo ! 

Whate'er  they  be,  I  '11  eat  ray  head, 

But  I  will  beat  them  hollow.'  " 

FRED  VINCY,  we  have  seen,  had  a  debt  on  his  mind, 
and  though  no  such  immaterial  burthen  could  de- 
press that  buoyant-hearted  young  gentleman  for 
many  hours  together,  there  were  circumstances  con- 
nected with  this  debt  which  made  the  thought  of  it 
unusually  importunate.  The  creditor  was  Mr.  Bain- 
bridge,  a  horse-dealer  of  the  neighbourhood,  whose 
company  was  much  sought  in  Middlemarch  by  young 
men  understood  to  be  "  addicted  to  pleasure."  Dur- 
ing the  vacations  Fred  had  naturally  required  more 
amusements  than  he  had  ready  money  for,  and  Mr. 
Bambridge  had  been  accommodating  enough  not  only 
to  trust  him  for  the  hire  of  horses  and  the  acciden- 
tal expense  of  ruining  a  fine  hunter,  but  also  to 
make  a  small  advance  by  which  he  might  be  able 
to  meet  some  losses  at  billiards.  The  total  debt 
was  a  hundred  and  sixty  pounds.  Bambridge  was 
in  no  alarm  about  his  money,  being  sure  that  young 
Vincy  had  backers  :  but  he  had  required  something 
to  show  for  it,  and  Fred  had  at  first  given  a  bill 


314  MIDDLEMARCH. 

with  his  own  signature.  Three  months  later  he  had 
renewed  this  bill  with  the  signature  of  Caleb  Garth. 
On  both  occasions  Fred  had  felt  confident  that  he 
should  meet  the  bill  himself,  having  ample  funds  at 
disposal  in  his  own  hopefulness.  You  will  hardly 
demand  that  his  confidence  should  have  a  basis  in 
external  facts  ;  such  confidence,  we  know,  is  some- 
thing less  coarse  and  materialistic:  it  is  a  com- 
fortable disposition  leading  us  to  expect  that  the 
wisdom  of  providence  or  the  folly  of  our  friends,  the 
mysteries  of  luck  or  the  still  greater  mystery  of 
our  high  individual  value  in  the  universe,  will  bring 
about  agreeable  issues,  such  as  are  consistent  with 
our  good  taste  in  costume,  and  our  general  prefer- 
ence for  the  best  style  of  thing.  Fred  felt  sure 
that  he  should  have  a  present  from  his  uncle,  that 
he  should  have  a  run  of  luck,  that  by  dint  of  "  swap- 
ping "  he  should  gradually  metamorphose  a  horse 
worth  forty  pounds  into  a  horse  that  would  fetch 
a  hundred  at  any  moment,  —  "  judgment "  being  al- 
ways equivalent  to  an  unspecified  sum  in  hard  cash. 
And  in  any  case,  even  supposing  negations  which 
only  a  morbid  distrust  could  imagine,  Fred  had 
always  (at  that  time)  his  father's  pocket  as  a  last 
resource,  so  that  his  assets  of  hopefulness  had  a  sort 
of  gorgeous  superfluity  about  them.  Of  what  might 
be  the  capacity  of  his  father's  pocket,  Fred  had  only 
a  vague  notion :  was  not  trade  elastic  ?  And  would 
not  the  deficiencies  of  one  year  be  made  up  for  by 
the  surplus  of  another  ?  The  Vincys  lived  in  an 
easy  profuse  way,  not  with  any  new  ostentation,  but 
according  to  the  family  habits  and  traditions,  so 
that  the  children  had  no  standard  of  economy,  and 
the  elder  ones  retained  some  of  their  infantine  notion 
that  their  father  might  pay  for  anything  if  he  would. 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  315 

Mr.  Vincy  himself  had  expensive  Middlemarch  hab- 
its, —  spent  money  on  coursing,  on  his  cellar,  and  on 
dinner-giving,  —  while  mamma  had  those  running 
accounts  with  tradespeople  which  give  a  cheerful 
sense  of  getting  everything  one  wants  without  any 
question  of  payment.  But  it  was  in  the  nature  of 
fathers,  Fred  knew,  to  bully  one  about  expenses: 
there  was  always  a  little  storm  over  his  extravagance 
if  he  had  to  disclose  a  debt,  and  Fred  disliked  bad 
weather  within  doors.  He  was  too  filial  to  be  dis- 
respectful to  his  father,  and  he  bore  the  thunder 
with  the  certainty  that  it  was  transient ;  but  in  the 
mean  time  it  was  disagreeable  to  see  his  mother  cry, 
and  also  to  be  obliged  to  look  sulky  instead  of  hav- 
ing fun ;  for  Fred  was  so  good-tempered  that  if  he 
looked  glum  under  scolding,  it  was  chiefly  for  pro- 
priety's sake.  The  easier  course,  plainly,  was  to  re- 
new the  bill  with  a  friend's  signature.  Why  not  ? 
With  the  superfluous  securities  of  hope  at  his  com- 
mand, there  was  no  reason  why  he  should  not  have 
increased  other  people's  liabilities  to  any  extent,  but 
for  the  fact  that  men  whose  names  were  good  for 
anything  were  usually  pessimists  indisposed  to  be- 
lieve that  the  universal  order  of  things  would  neces- 
sarily be  agreeable  to  an  agreeable  young  gentleman. 
With  a  favour  to  ask  we  review  our  list  of  friends, 
do  justice  to  their  more  amiable  qualities,  forgive 
their  little  offences,  and  concerning  each  in  turn, 
try  to  arrive  at  the  conclusion  that  he  will  be  eager 
to  oblige  us,  our  own  eagerness  to  be  obliged  being 
as  communicable  as  other  warmth.  Still  there  is 
always  a  certain  number  who  are  dismissed  as  but 
moderately  eager  until  the  others  have  refused ;  and 
it  happened  that  Fred  checked  off  all  his  friends  but 
one,  on  the  ground  that  applying  to  them  would  be 


316  MIDDLEMARCH. 

disagreeable ;  being  implicitly  convinced  that  he  at 
least  (whatever  might  be  maintained  about  mankind 
generally)  had  a  right  to  be  free  from  anything  dis- 
agreeable. That  he  should  ever  fall  into  a  thor- 
oughly unpleasant  position  —  wear  trousers  shrunk 
with  washing,  eat  cold  mutton,  have  to  walk  for 
want  of  a  horse,  or  to  "  duck  under  "  in  any  sort  of 
way  —  was  an  absurdity  irreconcilable  with  those 
cheerful  intuitions  implanted  in  him  by  nature. 
And  Fred  winced  under  the  idea  of  being  looked 
down  upon  as  wanting  funds  for  small  debts.  Thus 
it  came  to  pass  that  the  friend  whom  he  chose  to 
apply  to  was  at  once  the  poorest  and  the  kindest,  — 
namely,  Caleb  Garth. 

The  Garths  were  very  fond  of  Fred,  as  he  was  of 
them ;  for  when  he  and  Kosamond  were  little  ones, 
and  the  Garths  were  better  off,  the  slight  connection 
between  the  two  families  through  Mr.  Featherstone's 
double  marriage  (the  first  to  Mr.  Garth's  sister,  and 
the  second  to  Mrs.  Vincy's)  had  led  to  an  acquaint- 
ance which  was  carried  on  between  the  children 
rather  than  the  parents  :  the  children  drank  tea 
together  out  of  their  toy  teacups,  and  spent  whole 
days  together  in  play.  Mary  was  a  little  hoyden, 
and  Fred  at  six  years  old  thought  her  the  nicest 
girl  in  the  world,  making  her  his  wife  with  a  brass 
ring  which  he  had  cut  from  an  umbrella.  Through 
all  the  stages  of  his  education  he  had  kept  his  affec- 
tion for  the  Garths,  and  his  habit  of  going  to  their 
house  as  a  second  home,  though  any  intercourse 
between  them  and  the  elders  of  his  family  had  long 
ceased.  Even  when  Caleb  Garth  was  prosperous, 
the  Vincys  were  on  condescending  terms  with  him 
and  his  wife,  for  there  were  nice  distinctions  of  rank 
in  Middlemarch ;  and  though  old  manufacturers 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  317 

could  not  any  more  than  dukes  be  connected  with 
none  but  equals,  they  were  conscious  of  an  inherent 
social  superiority  which  was  defined  with  great 
nicety  in  practice,  though  hardly  expressible  theo- 
retically. Since  then  Mr.  Garth  had  failed  in  the 
building  business,  which  he  had  unfortunately  added 
to  his  other  avocations  of  surveyor,  valuer,  and 
agent,  had  conducted  that  business  for  a  time 
entirely  for  the  benefit  of  his  assignees,  and  had 
been  living  narrowly,  exerting  himself  to  the  utmost 
that  he  might  after  all  pay  twenty  shillings  in  the 
pound.  He  had  now  achieved  this,  and  from  all 
who  did  not  think  it  a  bad  precedent,  his  honourable 
exertions  had  won  him  due  esteem ;  but  in  no  part 
of  the  world  is  genteel  visiting  founded  on  esteem, 
in  the  absence  of  suitable  furniture  and  complete 
dinner-service.  Mrs.  Vincy  had  never  been  at  her 
ease  with  Mrs.  Garth,  and  frequently  spoke  of  her 
as  a  woman  who  had  had  to  work  for  her  bread,  — 
meaning  that  Mrs.  Garth  had  been  a  teacher  before 
her  marriage ;  in  which  case  an  intimacy  with 
Lindley  Murray  and  Mangnall's  Questions  was 
something  like  a  draper's  discrimination  of  calico 
trademarks,  or  a  courier's  acquaintance  with  foreign 
countries :  no  woman  who  was  better  off  needed 
that  sort  of  thing.  And  since  Mary  had  been  keep- 
ing Mr.  Featherstone's  house,  Mrs.  Vincy's  want 
of  liking  for  the  Garths  had  been  converted  into 
something  more  positive,  by  alarm  lest  Fred  should 
engage  himself  to  this  plain  girl,  whose  parents 
"  lived  in  such  a  small  way."  Fred,  being  aware  of 
this,  never  spoke  at  home  of  his  visits  to  Mrs.  Garth, 
which  had  of  late  become  more  frequent,  the  increas- 
ing ardour  of  his  affection  for  Mary  inclining  him 
the  more  towards  those  who  belonged  to  her. 


3i  8  MIDDLEMARCH. 

Mr.  Garth  had  a  small  office  in  the  town,  and  to 
this  Fred  went  with  his  request.  He  obtained  it 
without  much  difficulty,  for  a  large  amount  of  pain- 
ful experience  had  not  sufficed  to  make  Caleb  Garth 
cautious  about  his  own  affairs,  or  distrustful  of  his 
fellow-men  when  they  had  not  proved  themselves 
untrustworthy ;  and  he  had  the  highest  opinion  of 
Fred,  was  "sure  the  lad  would  turn  out  well,  —  an 
open  affectionate  fellow,  with  a  good  bottom  to  his 
character,  —  you  might  trust  him  for  anything." 
Such  was  Caleb's  psychological  argument.  He  was 
one  of  those  rare  men  who  are  rigid  to  themselves 
and  indulgent  to  others.  He  had  a  certain  shame 
about  his  neighbours'  errors,  and  never  spoke  of 
them  willingly ;  hence  he  was  not  likely  to  divert 
his  mind  from  the  best  mode  of  hardening  timber 
and  other  ingenious  devices  in  order  to  preconceive 
those  errors.  If  he  had  to  blame  any  one,  it  was 
necessary  for  him  to  move  all  the  papers  within  his 
reach,  or  describe  various  diagrams  with  his  stick, 
or  make  calculations  with  the  odd  money  in  his 
pocket,  before  he  could  begin ;  and  he  would  rather 
do  other  men's  work  than  find  fault  with  their 
doing.  I  fear  he  was  a  bad  disciplinarian. 

When  Fred  stated  the  circumstances  of  his  debt, 
his  wish  to  meet  it  without  troubling  his  father, 
and  the  certainty  that  the  money  would  be  forth- 
corning  so  as  to  cause  no  one  any  inconvenience, 
Caleb  pushed  his  spectacles  upward,  listened,  looked 
into  his  favourite's  clear  young  eyes,  and  believed 
him,  not  distinguishing  confidence  about  the  future 
from  veracity  about  the  past;  but  he  felt  that  it 
was  an  occasion  for  a  friendly  hint  as  to  conduct, 
and  that  before  giving  his  signature  he  must  give  a 
rather  strong  admonition.  Accordingly,  he  took 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  319 

the  paper  and  lowered  his  spectacles,  measured  the 
space  at  his  command,  reached  his  pen  and  exam- 
ined it,  dipped  it  in  the  ink  and  examined  it  again, 
then  pushed  the  paper  a  little  way  from  him,  lifted 
up  his  spectacles  again,  showed  a  deepened  depres- 
sion in  the  outer  angle  of  his  bushy  eyebrows, 
which  gave  his  face  a  peculiar  mildness  (pardon 
these  details  for  once, — you  would  have  learned  to 
love  them  if  you  had  known  Caleb  Garth),  and  said 
in  a  comfortable  tone,  — 

"It  was  a  misfortune,  eh,  that  breaking  the 
horse's  knees?  And  then,  these  exchanges,  they 
don't  answer  when  you  have  'cute  jockeys  to  deal 
with.  You'll  be  wiser  another  time,  my  boy." 

Whereupon  Caleb  drew  down  his  spectacles,  and 
proceeded  to  write  his  signature  with  the  care  which 
he  always  gave  to  that  performance ;  for  whatever 
he  did  in  the  way  of  business  he  did  well.  He  con- 
templated the  large  well-proportioned  letters  and 
final  flourish,  with  his  head  a  trifle  on  one  side  for 
an  instant,  then  handed  it  to  Fred,  said  "  Good-by," 
and  returned  forthwith  to  his  absorption  in  a  plan 
for  Sir  James  Chettam's  new  farm-buildings. 

Either  because  his  interest  in  this  work  thrust 
the  incident  of  the  signature  from  his  memory,  or 
for  some  reason  of  which  Caleb  was  more  conscious, 
Mrs.  Garth  remained  ignorant  of  the  affair. 

Since  it  occurred,  a  change  had  come  over  Fred's 
sky,  which  altered  his  view  of  the  distance,  and  was 
the  reason  why  his  uncle  Featherstone's  present  of 
money  was  of  importance  enough  to  make  his  colour 
come  and  go,  first  with  a  too  definite  expectation, 
and  afterwards  with  a  proportionate  disappointment. 
His  failure  in  passing  his  examination  had  made 
his  accumulation  of  college  debts  the  more  unpar- 


320  MIDDLEMARCH. 

donable  by  his  father,  and  there  had  been  an  unprece- 
dented storm  at  home.  Mr.  Vincy  had  sworn  that 
if  he  had  anything  more  of  that  sort  to  put  up  with, 
Fred  should  turn  out  and  get  his  living  how  he 
could ;  and  he  had  never  yet  quite  recovered  his 
good-humoured  tone  to  his  son,  who  had  especially 
enraged  him  by  saying  at  this  stage  of  things  that 
he  did  not  want  to  be  a  clergyman,  and  would 
rather  not  "  go  on  with  that."  Fred  was  conscious 
that  he  would  have  been  yet  more  severely  dealt 
with  if  his  family  as  well  as  himself  had  nc-t  secretly 
regarded  him  as  Mr.  Featherstone's  heir;  that  old 
gentleman's  pride  in  him,  and  apparent  fondness  for 
him,  serving  in  the  stead  of  more  exemplary  con- 
duct, —  just  as  when  a  youthful  nobleman  steals 
jewellery  we  call  the  act  kleptomania,  speak  of  it 
with  a  philosophical  smile,  and  never  think  of  his 
being  sent  to  the  house  of  correction  as  if  he  were  a 
ragged  boy  who  had  stolen  turnips.  In  fact,  tacit 
expectations  of  what  would  be  done  for  him  by 
Uncle  Featherstone  determined  the  angle  at  which 
most  people  viewed  Fred  Vincy  in  Middlemarch ; 
and  in  his  own  consciousness,  what  Uncle  Feather- 
stone  would  do  for  him  in  an  emergency,  or  what 
he  would  do  simply  as  an  incorporated  luck,  formed 
always  an  immeasurable  depth  of  aerial  perspective. 
But  that  present  of  bank-notes,  once  made,  was 
measurable,  and  being  applied  to  the  amount  of  the 
debt,  showed  a  deficit  which  had  still  to  be  filled  up 
either  by  Fred's  "  judgment "  or  by  luck  in  some 
other  shape.  For  that  little  episode  of  the  alleged 
borrowing,  in  which  he  had  made  his  father  the 
agent  in  getting  the  Bulstrode  certificate,  was  a  new 
reason  against  going  to  his  father  for  money  towards 
meeting  his  actual  debt.  Fred  was  keen  enough  to 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  321 

foresee  that  anger  would  confuse  distinctions,  and 
that  his  denial  of  having  borrowed  expressly  on  the 
strength  of  his  uncle's  will  would  be  taken  as  a 
falsehood.  He  had  gone  to  his  father  and  told  him 
one  vexatious  affair,  and  he  had  left  another  untold: 
in  such  cases  the  complete  revelation  always  pro- 
duces the  impression  of  a  previous  duplicity.  Now 
Fred  piqued  himself  on  keeping  clear  of  lies,  and 
even  fibs ;  he  often  shrugged  his  shoulders  and 
made  a  significant  grimace  at  what  he  called  Kosa- 
uiond's  fibs  (it  is  only  brothers  who  can  associate 
such  ideas  with  a  lovely  girl) ;  and  rather  than 
incur  the  accusation  of  falsehood  he  would  even 
incur  some  trouble  and  self-restraint.  It  was  under 
strong  inward  pressure  of  this  kind  that  Fred  had 
taken  the  wise  step  of  depositing  the  eighty  pounds 
with  his  mother.  It  was  a  pity  that  he  had  not  at 
once  given  them  to  Mr.  Garth;  but  he  meant  to 
make  the  sum  complete  with  another  sixty,  and 
with  a  view  to  this,  he  had  kept  twenty  pounds  in 
his  own  pocket  as  a  sort  of  seed-corn,  which,  planted 
by  judgment  and  watered  by  luck,  might  yield  more 
than  threefold,  —  a  very  poor  rate  of  multiplication 
when  the  field  is  a  young  gentleman's  infinite  soul, 
with  all  the  numerals  at  command. 

Fred  was  not  a  gambler :  he  had  not  that  specific 
disease  in  which  the  suspension  of  the  whole  ner- 
vous energy  on  a  chance  or  risk  becomes  as  neces- 
sary as  the  dram  to  the  drunkard ;  he  had  only  the 
tendency  to  that  diffusive  form  of  gambling  which 
has  no  alcoholic  intensity,  but  is  carried  on  with 
the  healthiest  chyle-fed  blood,  keeping  up  a  joyous 
imaginative  activity  which  fashions  events  accord- 
ing to  desire,  and  having  no  fears  about  its  own 
weather,  only  sees  the  advantage  there  must  be  to 

VOL.  I.— 21 


322  MIDDLEMARCH. 

others  in  going  aboard  with.  it.  Hopefulness  has  a 
pleasure  in  making  a  throw  of  any  kind,  because  the 
prospect  of  success  is  certain ;  and  only  a  more  gen- 
erous pleasure  in  offering  as  many  as  possible  a 
share  in  the  stake.  Fred  liked  play,  especially  bil- 
liards, as  he  liked  hunting  or  riding  a  steeple-chase ; 
and  he  only  liked  it  the  better  because  he  wanted 
money  and  hoped  to  win.  But  the  twenty  pounds' 
worth  of  seed-corn  had  been  planted  in  vain  in  the 
seductive  green  plot,  —  all  of  it  at  least  which  had 
not  been  dispersed  by  the  roadside,  —  and  Fred  found 
himself  close  upon  the  term  of  payment,  with  no 
money  at  command  beyond  the  eighty  pounds  which 
he  had  deposited  with  his  mother.  The  broken- 
winded  horse  which  he  rode  represented  a  present 
which  had  been  made  to  him  a  long  while  ago  by 
his  uncle  Featherstone :  his  father  always  allowed 
him  to  keep  a  horse,  Mr.  Vincy's  own  habits  making 
him  regard  this  as  a  reasonable  demand  even  for  a 
son  who  was  rather  exasperating.  This  horse,  then, 
was  Fred's  property,  and  in  his  anxiety  to  meet  the 
imminent  bill  he  determined  to  sacrifice  a  possession 
without  which  life  would  certainly  be  worth  little. 
He  made  the  resolution  with  a  sense  of  heroism,  — 
heroism  forced  on  him  by  the  dread  of  breaking  his 
word  to  Mr.  Garth,  by  his  love  for  Mary  and  awe 
of  her  opinion.  He  would  start  for  Houndsley 
horse-fair  which  was  to  be  held  the  next  morning, 
and  —  simply  sell  his  horse,  bringing  back  the 
money  by  coach  ?  —  Well,  the  horse  would  hardly 
fetch  more  than  thirty  pounds,  and  there  was  no 
knowing  what  might  happen ;  it  would  be  folly  to 
balk  himself  of  luck  beforehand.  It  was  a  hundred 
to  one  that  some  good  chance  would  fall  in  his  way ; 
the  longer  he  thought  of  it,  the  less  possible  it  seemed 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  323 

that  he  should  not  have  a  good  chance,  and  the  less 
reasonable  that  he  should  not  equip  himself  with 
the  powder  and  shot  for  bringing  it  down.  He 
would  ride  to  Houndsley  with  Bambridge  and  with 
Horrock  "  the  vet,"  and  without  asking  them  any- 
thing expressly,  he  should  virtually  get  the  benefit 
of  their  opinion.  Before  he  set  out,  Fred  got  the 
eighty  pounds  from  his  mother. 

Most  of  those  who  saw  Fred  riding  out  of 
Middlemarch  in  company  with  Bambridge  and 
Horrock,  on  his  way  of  course  to  Houndsley  horse- 
fair,  thought  that  young  Vincy  was  pleasure-seeking 
as  usual ;  and  but  for  an  unwonted  consciousness 
of  grave  matters  on  hand,  he  himself  would  have 
had  a  sense  of  dissipation,  and  of  doing  what 
might  be  expected  of  a  gay  young  fellow.  Consid- 
ering that  Fred  was  not  at  all  coarse,  that  he 
rather  looked  down  on  the  manners  and  speech  of 
young  men  who  had  not  been  to  the  university,  and 
that  he  had  written  stanzas  as  pastoral  and  unvo- 
luptuous  as  his  flute-playing,  his  attraction  towards 
Bambridge  and  Horrock  was  an  interesting  fact 
which  even  the  love  of  horse-flesh  would  not 
wholly  account  for  without  that  mysterious  influ- 
ence of  Naming  which  determinates  so  much  of 
mortal  choice.  Under  any  other  name  than 
"  pleasure  "  the  society  of  Messieurs  Bambridge 
and  Horrock  must  certainly  have  been  regarded  as 
monotonous ;  and  to  arrive  with  them  at  Houndsley 
on  a  drizzling  afternoon,  to  get  down  at  the  Ked 
Lion  in  a  street  shaded  with  coal-dust,  and  dine 
in  a  room  furnished  with  a  dirt-enarnelled  map  of 
the  county,  a  bad  portrait  of  an  anonymous  horse 
in  a  stable,  His  Majesty  George  the  Fourth  with 
legs  and  cravat,  and  various  leaden  spittoons, 


324  MIDDLEMARCH. 

might  have  seemed  a  hard  business,  but  for  the 
sustaining  power  of  nomenclature  which  deter- 
mined that  the  pursuit  of  these  things  was  "  gay.  " 

In  Mr.  Horrock  there  was  certainly  an  apparent 
unfathomableness  which  offered  play  to  the  imagi- 
nation. Costume,  at  a  glance,  gave  him  a  thrilling 
association  with  horses  (enough  to  specify  the  hat- 
brim  which  took  the  slightest  upward  angle  just 
to  escape  the  suspicion  of  bending  downwards),  and 
nature  had  given  him  a  face  which  by  dint  of 
Mongolian  eyes,  and  a  nose,  mouth,  and  chin 
seeming  to  follow  his  hat-brim  in  a  moderate  incli- 
nation upwards,  gave  the  effect  of  a  subdued, 
unchangeable,  sceptical  smile,  of  all  expressions 
the  most  tyrannous  over  a  susceptible  mind,  and, 
when  accompanied  by  adequate  silence,  likely  to 
create  the  reputation  of  an  invincible  understand- 
ing, an  infinite  fund  of  humour, —  too  dry  to  flow, 
and  probably  in  a  state  of  immovable  crust,  —  and 
a  critical  judgment  which,  if  you  could  ever  be 
fortunate  enough  to  know  it,  would  be  the  thing 
and  no  other.  It  is  a  physiognomy  seen  in  all 
vocations,  but  perhaps  it  has  never  been  more 
powerful  over  the  youth  of  England  than  in  a 
judge  of  horses. 

Mr.  Horrock,  at  a  question  from  Fred  about  his 
horse's  fetlock,  turned  sideways  in  his  saddle,  and 
watched  the  horse's  action  for  the  space  of  three 
minutes,  then  turned  forward,  twitched  his  own 
bridle,  and  remained  silent  with  a  profile  neither 
more  nor  less  sceptical  than  it  had  been. 

The  part  thus  played  in  dialogue  by  Mr.  Hor- 
rock was  terribly  effective.  A  mixture  of  pas- 
sions was  excited  in  Fred, —  a  mad  desire  to  thrash 
Horrock 's  opinion  into  utterance,  restrained  by 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  325 

anxiety  to  retain  the  advantage  of  his  friend- 
ship. There  was  always  the  chance  that  Horrock 
might  say  something  quite  invaluable  at  the  right 
moment. 

Mr.  Bambridge  had  more  open  manners,  and 
appeared  to  give  forth  his  ideas  without  economy. 
He  was  loud,  robust,  and  was  sometimes  spoken 
of  as  being  "  given  to  indulgence, "  —  chiefly  in 
swearing,  drinking,  and  beating  his  wife.  Some 
people  who  had  lost  by  him  called  him  a  vicious 
man  ;  but  he  regarded  horse-dealing  as  the  finest  of 
the  arts,  and  might  have  argued  plausibly  that  it 
had  nothing  to  do  with  morality.  He  was  undeni- 
ably a  prosperous  man,  bore  his  drinking  better 
than  others  bore  their  moderation,  and,  on  the 
whole,  flourished  like  the  green  bay-tree.  But  his 
range  of  conversation  was  limited,  and  like  the  fine 
old  tune,  "  Drops  of  brandy, "  gave  you  after  a 
while  a  sense  of  returning  upon  itself  in  a  way  that 
might  make  weak  heads  dizzy.  But  a  slight  infu- 
sion of  Mr.  Bambridge  was  felt  to  give  tone  and 
character  to  several  circles  in  Middlemarch;  and 
he  was  a  distinguished  figure  in  the  bar  and 
billiard-room  at  the  Green  Dragon.  He  knew 
some  anecdotes  about  the  heroes  of  the  turf,  and 
various  clever  tricks  of  Marquesses  and  Viscounts 
which  seemed  to  prove  that  blood  asserted  its  pre- 
eminence even  among  blacklegs ;  but  the  minute 
retentiveness  of  his  memory  was  chiefly  shown 
about  the  horses  he  had  himself  bought  and  sold ; 
the  number  of  miles  they  would  trot  you  in  no 
time  without  turning  a  hair  being,  after  the  lapse 
of  years,  still  a  subject  of  passionate  asseveration, 
in  which  he  would  assist  the  imagination  of  his 
hearers  by  solemnly  swearing  that  they  never  saw 


326  MIDDLEMARCH. 

anything  like  it.      In  short,  Mr.  Bambridge  was  a 
man  of  pleasure  and  a  gay  companion. 

Fred  was  subtle,  and  did  not  tell  his  friends 
that  he  was  going  to  Houndsley  bent  on  selling 
his  horse :  he  wished  to  get  indirectly  at  their 
genuine  opinion  of  its  value,  not  being  aware  that 
a  genuine  opinion  was  the  last  thing  likely  to  be 
extracted  from  such  eminent  critics.  It  was  not 
Mr.  Bambridge 's  weakness  to  be  a  gratuitous 
flatterer.  He  had  never  before  been  so  much 
struck  with  the  fact  that  this  unfortunate  bay  was 
a  roarer  to  a  degree  which  required  the  roundest 
word  for  perdition  to  give  you  any  idea  of  it. 

"  You  made  a  bad  hand  at  swapping  when  you 
went  to  anybody  but  me,  Vincy !  Why,  you  never 
threw  your  leg  across  a  finer  horse  than  that  chest- 
nut, and  you  gave  him  for  this  brute.  If  you  set 
him  cantering,  he  goes  on  like  twenty  sawyers.  I 
never  heard  but  one  worse  roarer  in  my  life,  and 
that  was  a  roan :  it  belonged  to  Pegwell,  the  corn- 
factor  ;  he  used  to  drive  him  in  his  gig  seven  years 
ago,  and  he  wanted  me  to  take  him,  but  I  said, 
'  Thank  you,  Peg,  I  don't  deal  in  wind-instru- 
ments. '  That  was  what  I  said.  It  went  the  round 
of  the  country,  that  joke  did.  But,  what  the 
hell !  the  horse  was  a  penny  trumpet  to  that  roarer 
of  yours. " 

"  Why,  you  said  just  now  his  was  worse  than 
mine,"  said  Fred,  more  irritable  than  usual. 

"  I  said  a  lie,  then, "  said  Mr.  Bambridge, 
emphatically.  "There  was  n't  a  penny  to  choose 
between  'em. " 

Fred  spurred  his  horse,  and  they  trotted  on  a 
little  way.  When  they  slackened  again,  Mr..  Barn- 
bridge  said,  — 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  327 

"  Not  but  what  the  roan  was  a  better  trotter  than 
yours. " 

"  I  'm  quite  satisfied  with  his  paces,  I  know, " 
said  Fred,  who  required  all  the  consciousness  of 
being  in  gay  company  to  support  him ;  "  I  say  his 
trot  is  an  uncommonly  clean  one,  eh,  Horrock  ?  " 

Mr.  Horrock  looked  before  him  with  as  complete 
a  neutrality  as  if  he  had  been  a  portrait  by  a  great 
master. 

Fred  gave  up  the  fallacious  hope  of  getting  a 
genuine  opinion  ;  but  on  reflection  he  saw  that 
Bambridge's  depreciation  and  Horrock 's  silence 
were  both  virtually  encouraging,  and  indicated  that 
they  thought  better  of  the  horse  than  they  chose 
to  say. 

That  very  evening,  indeed,  before  the  fair  had  set 
in,  Fred  thought  he  saw  a  favourable  opening  for 
disposing  advantageously  of  his  horse,  but  an  open- 
ing which  made  him  congratulate  himself  on  his 
foresight  in  bringing  with  him  his  eighty  pounds. 
A  young  farmer,  acquainted  with  Mr.  Bambridge, 
came  into  the  Eed  Lion,  and  entered  into  conver- 
sation about  parting  with  a  hunter,  which  he 
introduced  at  once  as  Diamond,  implying  that  it 
was  a  public  character.  For  himself  he  only 
wanted  a  useful  hack,  which  would  draw  upon 
occasion ;  being  about  to  marry  and  to  give  up 
hunting.  The  hunter  was  in  a  friend's  stable  at 
some  little  distance ;  there  was  still  time  for  gen- 
tlemen to  see  it  before  dark.  The  friend's  stable 
had  to  be  reached  through  a  back  street  where 
you  might  as  easily  have  been  poisoned  without 
expense  of  drugs  as  in  any  grim  street  of  that 
unsanitary  period.  Fred  was  not  fortified  against 
disgust  by  brandy,  as  his  companions  were,  but 


328  MIDDLEMARCH. 

the  hope  of  having  at  last  seen  the  horse  that  would 
enable  him  to  make  money  was  exhilarating 
enough  to  lead  him  over  the  same  ground  again  the 
first  thing  in  the  morning.  He  felt  sure  that  if 
he  did  not  come  to  a  bargain  with  the  farmer, 
Bambridge  would ;  for  the  stress  of  circumstances, 
Fred  felt,  was  sharpening  his  acuteness,  and  en- 
dowing him  with  all  the  constructive  power  of 
suspicion.  Bambridge  had  run  down  Diamond  in 
a  way  that  he  never  would  have  done  (the  horse 
being  a  friend's)  if  he  had  not  thought  of  buying 
it ;  every  one  who  looked  at  the  animal  —  even 
Horrock  —  was  evidently  impressed  with  its  merit. 
To  get  all  the  advantage  of  being  with  men  of  this 
sort,  you  must  know  how  to  draw  your  inferences, 
and  not  be  a  spoon  who  takes  things  literally. 
The  colour  of  the  horse  was  a  dappled  gray,  and 
Fred  happened  to  know  that  Lord  Medlicote's  man 
was  on  the  look-out  for  just  such  a  horse.  After 
all  his  running  down,  Bambridge  let  it  out  in  the 
course  of  the  evening,  when  the  farmer  was  absent, 
that  he  had  seen  worse  horses  go  for  eighty  pounds. 
Of  course  he  contradicted  himself  twenty  times 
over,  but  when  you  know  what  is  likely  to  be  true 
you  can  test  a  man's  admissions.  And  Fred 
could  not  but  reckon  his  own  judgment  of  a  horse 
as  worth  something.  The  farmer  had  paused  over 
Fred's  respectable  though  broken-winded  steed 
long  enough  to  show  that  he  thought  it  worth 
consideration,  and  it  seemed  probable  that  he 
would  take  it,  with  five-and-twenty  pounds  in 
addition,  as  the  equivalent  of  Diamond.  In  that 
case  Fred,  when  he  had  parted  with  his  new  horse 
for  at  least  eighty  pounds,  would  be  fifty-five 
pounds  in  pocket  by  the  transaction,  and  would 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  329 

have  a  hundred  and  thirty-five  pounds  towards 
meeting  the  bill;  so  that  the  deficit  temporarily 
thrown  on  Mr.  Garth  would  at  the  utmost  be 
twenty-five  pounds.  By  the  time  he  was  hurrying 
on  his  clothes  in  the  morning,  he  saw  so  clearly 
the  importance  of  not  losing  this  rare  chance,  that 
if  Bambridge  and  Horrock  had  both  dissuaded 
him,  he  would  not  have  been  deluded  into  a  direct 
interpretation  of  their  purpose :  he  would  have 
been  aware  that  those  deep  hands  held  something 
else  than  a  young  fellow's  interest.  With  regard 
to  horses,  distrust  was  your  only  clew.  But  scep- 
ticism, as  we  know,  can  never  be  thoroughly 
applied,  else  life  would  come  to  a  standstill : 
something  we  must  believe  in  and  do,  and  what- 
ever that  something  may  be  called,  it  is  virtually 
our  own  judgment,  even  when  it  seems  like  the 
most  slavish  reliance  on  another.  Fred  believed 
in  the  excellence  of  his  bargain,  and  even  before 
the  fair  had  well  set  in,  had  got  possession  of  the 
dappled  gray,  at  the  price  of  his  old  horse  and 
thirty  pounds  in  addition, —  only  five  pounds  more 
than  he  had  expected  to  give. 

But  he  felt  a  little  worried  and  wearied,  perhaps 
with  mental  debate ;  and  without  waiting  for  the 
further  gayeties  of  the  horse-fair,  he  set  out  alone 
on  his  fourteen  miles'  journey,  meaning  to  take 
it  very  quietly  and  keep  his  horse  fresh. 


CHAPTEK  XXIV. 

The  offender's  sorrow  brings  but  small  relief 
To  him  who  wears  the  strong  offence's  cross. 

SHAKESPEARE  :  Sonnets 

I  AM  sorry  to  say  that  only  the  third  day  after  the 
propitious  events  at  Houndsley  Fred  Vincy  had 
fallen  into  worse  spirits  than  he  had  known  in  his 
life  before.  Not  that  he  had  been  disappointed 
as  to  the  possible  market  for  his  horse,  but  that 
before  the  bargain  could  be  concluded  with  Lord 
Medlicote's  man,  this  Diamond,  in  which  hope  to 
the  amount  of  eighty  pounds  had  been  invested, 
had  without  the  slightest  warning  exhibited  in 
the  stable  a  most  vicious  energy  in  kicking,  had 
just  missed  killing  the  groom,  and  had  ended  in 
laming  himself  severely  by  catching  his  leg  in  a 
rope  that  overhung  the  stable-board.  There  was 
no  more  redress  for  this  than  for  the  discovery  of 
bad  temper  after  marriage,  —  which  of  course  old 
companions  were  aware  of  before  the  ceremony. 
For  some  reason  or  other,  Fred  had  none  of  his 
usual  elasticity  under  this  stroke  of  ill-fortune  :  he 
was  simply  aware  that  he  had  only  fifty  pounds, 
that  there  was  no  chance  of  his  getting  any  more 
at  present,  and  that  the  bill  for  a  hundred  and 
sixty  would  be  presented  in  five  days.  Even  if  he 
had  applied  to  his  father  on  the  plea  that  Mr. 
Garth  should  be  saved  from  loss,  Fred  felt  smart- 
ingly  that  his  father  would  angrily  refuse  to  rescue 
Mr.  Garth  from  the  consequence  of  what  he  would 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  331 

call  encouraging  extravagance  and  deceit.  He  was 
so  utterly  downcast  that  he  could  frame  no  other 
project  than  to  go  straight  to  Mr.  Garth  and  tell 
him  the  sad  truth,  carrying  with  him  the  fifty 
pounds,  and  getting  that  sum  at  least  safely  out  of 
his  own  hands.  His  father,  being  at  the  ware- 
house, did  not  yet  know  of  the  accident :  when  he 
did,  he  would  storm  about  the  vicious  brute  being 
brought  into  his  stable;  and  before  meeting  that 
lesser  annoyance  Fred  wanted  to  get  away  with  all 
his  courage  to  face  the  greater.  He  took  his 
father's  nag,  for  he  had  made  up  his  mind  that 
when  he  had  told  Mr.  Garth,  he  would  ride  to 
Stone  Court  and  confess  all  to  Mary.  In  fact,  it 
is  probable  that  but  for  Mary's  existence  and  Fred's 
love  for  her,  his  conscience  would  have  been  much 
less  active,  both  in  previously  urging  the  debt  on 
his  thought,  and  impelling  him  not  to  spare  him- 
self after  his  usual  fashion  by  deferring  an  unpleas- 
ant task,  but  to  act  as  directly  and  simply  as  he 
could.  Even  much  stronger  mortals  than  Fred 
Vincy  hold  half  their  rectitude  in  the  mind  of 
the  being  they  love  best.  "  The  theatre  of  all  my 
actions  is  fallen, "  said  an  antique  personage  when 
his  chief  friend  was  dead ;  and  they  are  fortunate 
who  get  a  theatre  where  the  audience  demands 
their  best.  Certainly  it  would  have  made  a  con- 
siderable difference  to  Fred  at  that  time  if  Mary 
Garth  had  had  no  decided  notions  as  to  what  was 
admirable  in  character. 

Mr.  Garth  was  not  at  the  office,  and  Fred  rode 
on  to  his  house,  which  was  a  little  way  outside 
the  town,  —  a  homely  place  with  an  orchard  in 
front  of  it,  a  rambling,  old-fashioned,  half-tim- 
bered building,  which  before  the  town  had  spread 


332  MIDDLEMARCH. 

had  been  a  farm-house,  but  was  now  surrounded 
with  the  private  gardens  of  the  townsmen.  We 
get  the  fonder  of  our  houses  if  they  have  a  physi- 
ognomy of  their  own,  as  our  friends  have.  The 
Garth  family,  which  was  rather  a  large  one,  for 
Mary  had  four  brothers  and  one  sister,  were  very 
fond  of  their  old  house,  from  which  all  the  best 
furniture  had  long  been  sold.  Fred  liked  it  too, 
knowing  it  by  heart  even  to  the  attic,  which  smelt 
deliciously  of  apples  and  quinces,  and  until  to-day 
he  had  never  come  to  it  without  pleasant  expecta- 
tions ;  but  his  heart  beat  uneasily  now  with  the 
sense  that  he  should  probably  have  to  make  his 
confession  before  Mrs.  Garth,  of  whom  he  was 
rather  more  in  awe  than  of  her  husband.  Not  that 
she  was  inclined  to  sarcasm  and  to  impulsive 
sallies,  as  Mary  was.  In  her  present  matronly 
age  at  least,  Mrs.  Garth  never  committed  herself 
by  over-hasty  speech ;  having,  as  she  said,  borne 
the  yoke-  in  her  youth,  and  learned  self-control. 
She  had  that  rare  sense  which  discerns  what  is 
unalterable,  and  submits  to  it  without  murmuring. 
Adoring  her  husband's  virtues,  she  had  very  early 
made  up  her  mind  to  his  incapacity  of  minding  his 
own  interests,  and  had  met  the  consequences  cheer- 
fully. She  had  been  magnanimous  enough  to 
renounce  all  pride  in  teapots  or  children's  frilling, 
and  had  never  poured  any  pathetic  confidences  into 
the  ears  of  her  feminine  neighbours  concerning 
Mr.  Garth's  want  of  prudence  and  the  sums  he 
might  have  had  if  he  had  been  like  other  men. 
Hence  these  fair  neighbours  thought  her  either 
proud  or  eccentric,  and  sometimes  spoke  of  her  to 
their  husbands  as  "  your  fine  Mrs.  Garth. "  She 
was  not  without  her  criticism  of  them  in  return, 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  333 

being  more  accurately  instructed  than  most  matrons 
in  Middlemarch,  and  —  where  is  the  blameless 
woman  ?  —  apt  to  be  a  little  severe  towards  her 
own  sex,  which  in  her  opinion  was  framed  to  be 
entirely  subordinate.  On  the  other  hand,  she  was 
disproportionately  indulgent  towards  the  failings 
of  men,  and  was  often  heard  to  say  that  these  were 
natural.  Also,  it  must  be  admitted  that  Mrs. 
Garth  was  a  trifle  too  emphatic  in  her  resistance  to 
what  she  held  to  be  follies :  the  passage  from  gov- 
erness into  housewife  had  wrought  itself  a  little 
too  strongly  into  her  consciousness,  and  she  rarely 
forgot  that  while  her  grammar  and  accent  were 
above  the  town  standard,  she  wore  a  plain  cap, 
cooked  the  family  dinner,  and  darned  all  the  stock- 
ings. She  had  sometimes  taken  pupils  in  a  peri- 
patetic fashion,  making  them  follow  her  about  in 
the  kitchen  with  their  book  or  slate.  She  thought 
it  good  for  them  to  see  that  she  could  make  an 
excellent  lather  while  she  corrected  their  blunders 
"  without  looking, "  —  that  a  woman  with  her 
sleeves  tucked  up  above  her  elbows  might  know  all 
about  the  Subjunctive  Mood  or  the  Torrid  Zone,  — 
that,  in  short,  she  might  possess  "  education"  and 
other  good  things  ending  in  "tion, "  and  worthy 
to  be  pronounced  emphatically,  without  being  a 
useless  doll.  When  she  made  remarks  to  this 
edifying  effect,  she  had  a  firm  little  frown  on  her 
brow,  which  yet  did  not  hinder  her  face  from  look- 
ing benevolent,  and  her  words  which  came  forth 
like  a  procession  were  uttered  in  a  fervid  agreeable 
contralto.  Certainly  the  exemplary  Mrs.  Garth 
had  her  droll  aspects,  but  her  character  sustained 
her  oddities,  as  a  very  fine  wine  sustains  a  flavour 
of  skin. 


334  MIDDLEMAllCH. 

Towards  Fred  Vincy  she  had  a  motherly  feeling^ 
and  had  always  been  disposed  to  excuse  his  errors, 
though  she  would  probably  not  have  excused  Mary 
for  engaging  herself  to  him,  her  daughter  being  in- 
cluded in  that  more  rigorous  judgment  which  she 
applied  to  her  own  sex.  But  this  very  fact  of  her 
exceptional  indulgence  towards  him  made  it  the 
harder  to  Fred  that  he  must  now  inevitably  sink 
in  her  opinion.  And  the  circumstances  of  his  visit 
turned  out  to  be  still  more  unpleasant  than  he  had 
expected ;  for  Caleb  Garth  had  gone  out  early  to 
look  at  some  repairs  not  far  off.  Mrs.  Garth  at 
certain  hours  was  always  in  the  kitchen,  and  this 
morning  she  was  carrying  on  several  occupations 
at  once  there,  —  making  her  pies  at  the  well- 
scoured  deal  table  on  one  side  of  that  airy  room, 
observing  Sally's  movements  at  the  oven  and 
dough-tub  through  an  open  door,  and  giving  les- 
sons to  her  youngest  boy  and  girl,  who  were  stand- 
ing opposite  to  her  at  the  table  with  their  books 
and  slates  before  them.  A  tub  and  a  clothes-horse 
at  the  other  end  of  the  kitchen  indicated  an  inter- 
mittent wash  of  small  things  also  going  on. 

Mrs.  Garth,  with  her  sleeves  turned  above  her 
elbows,  deftly  handling  her  pastry,  —  applying  her 
rolling-pin  and  giving  ornamental  pinches,  while 
she  expounded  with  grammatical  fervour  what 
were  the  right  views  about  the  concord  of  verbs 
and  pronouns  with  "  nouns  of  multitude  or  signify- 
ing many,"  was  a  sight  agreeably  amusing.  She 
was  of  the  same  curly-haired,  square-faced  type  as 
Mary,  but  handsomer,  with  more  delicacy  of  fea- 
ture, a  pale  skin,  a  solid  matronly  figure,  and  a 
remarkable  firmness  of  glance.  In  her  snowy- 
frilled  cap  she  reminded  one  of  that  delightful 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  335 

Frenchwoman  whom  we  have  all  seen  marketing, 
basket  on  arm.  Looking  at  the  mother,  you  might 
hope  that  the  daughter  would  become  like  her, 
which  is  a  prospective  advantage  equal  to  a  dowry, 
—  the  mother  too  often  standing  behind  the  daugh- 
ter like  a  malignant  prophecy, —  *  Such  as  I  am, 
she  will  shortly  be. " 

"  Now  let  us  go  through  that  once  more, "  said 
Mrs.  Garth,  pinching  an  apple-puff  which  seemed 
to  distract  Ben,  an  energetic  young  male  with  a 
heavy  brow,  from  due  attention  to  the  lesson. 
*  '  Not  without  regard  to  the  import  of  the  word  as 
conveying  unity  or  plurality  of  idea,'  — tell  me 
again  what  that  means,  Ben.  " 

(Mrs.  Garth,  like  more  celebrated  educators,  had 
her  favourite  ancient  paths,  and  in  a  general  wreck 
of  society  would  have  tried  to  hold  her  "  Lindley 
Murray"  above  the  waves.) 

"  Oh  —  it  means  —  you  must  think  what  you 
mean, "  said  Ben,  rather  peevishly.  "  I  hate 
grammar.  What's  the  use  of  it?" 

"  To  teach  you  to  speak  and  write  correctly,  so 
that  you  can  be  understood,"  said  Mrs.  Garth, 
with  severe  precision.  "  Should  you  like  to  speak 
as  old  Job  does  ?  " 

"  Yes, "  said  Ben,  stoutly ;  "  it's  funnier.  He 
says,  'Yo  goo,'  —  that's  just  as  good  as  'You  go. ' 

"  But  he  says  'A  ship's  in  the  garden,'  instead 
of  'a  sheep,'"  said  Letty,  with  an  air  of  superior- 
ity. "  You  might  think  he  meant  a  ship  off  the 
sea." 

"No,  you  mightn't  if  you  weren't  silly,"  said 
Ben.  "  How  could  a  ship  off  the  sea  come  there  ?  " 

"  These  things  belong  only  to  pronunciation, 
which  is  the  least  part  of  grammar,"  said  Mra 


336  MIDDLEMARCH. 

Garth.  "  That  apple-peel  is  to  be  eaten  by  the 
pigs,  Ben ;  if  you  eat  it,  I  must  give  them  your 
piece  of  pasty.  Job  has  only  to  speak  about  very 
plain  things.  How  do  you  think  you  would  write 
or  speak  about  anything  more  difficult,  if  you 
knew  no  more  of  grammar  than  he  does?  You 
would  use  wrong  words,  and  put  words  in  the 
wrong  places,  and  instead  of  making  people  under- 
stand you,  they  would  turn  away  from  you  as  a 
tiresome  person.  What  would  you  do  then  ?  " 

"  I  shouldn't  care,  I  should  leave  off,"  said  Ben, 
with  a  sense  that  this  was  an  agreeable  issue  where 
grammar  was  concerned. 

"  I  see  you  are  getting  tired  and  stupid,  Ben, " 
said  Mrs.  Garth,  accustomed  to  these  obstructive 
arguments  from  her  male  offspring.  Having  finished 
her  pies,  she  moved  towards  the  clothes-horse,  and 
said,  "  Come  here  and  tell  me  the  story  I  told  you 
on  Wednesday,  about  Cincinnatus.  " 

"  I  know  !  he  was  a  farmer, "  said  Ben. 

"  Now,  Ben,  he  was  a  Eoman,  —  let  me  tell, " 
said  Letty,  using  her  elbow  contentiously. 

"  You  silly  thing,  he  was  a  Eoman  farmer,  and 
he  was  ploughing. " 

"  Yes,  but  before  that  —  that  did  n't  come  first  — 
people  wanted  him, "  said  Letty. 

"  Well,  but  you  must  say  what  sort  of  a  man  he 
was  first, "  insisted  Ben.  "  He  was  a  wise  man, 
like  my  father,  and  that  made  the  people  want  his 
advice.  And  he  was  a  brave  man,  and  could  fight. 
And  so  could  my  father  —  could  n't  he,  mother  ?  " 

"  Now,  Ben,  let  me  tell  the  story  straight 
on,  as  mother  told  it  us, "  said  Letty,  frowning. 
"  Please,  mother,  tell  Ben  not  to  speak. " 

"  Letty,  I  am  ashamed  of  you, "  said  her  mother, 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  337 

wringing  out  the  caps  from  the  tub.  "  When  your 
brother  began,  you  ought  to  have  waited  to  see  if 
he  could  not  tell  the  story.  How  rude  you  look, 
pushing  and  frowning,  as  if  you  wanted  to  con- 
quer with  your  elbows !  Cincinnatus,  I  am  sure, 
would  have  been  sorry  to  see  his  daughter  behave 
so. "  (Mrs.  Garth  delivered  this  awful  sentence 
with  much  majesty  of  enunciation,  and  Letty  felt 
that  between  repressed  volubility  and  general  dis- 
esteem,  that  of  the  Eomans  inclusive,  life  was 
already  a  painful  affair. )  "  Now,  Ben.  " 

"  Well  —  oh  —  well  —  why,  there  was  a  great 
deal  of  fighting,  and  they  were  all  blockheads,  and 
—  I  can't  tell  it  just  how  you  told  it  —  but  they 
wanted  a  man  to  be  captain  and  king  and  every- 
thing —  " 

"  Dictator,  now, "  said  Letty,  with  injured  looks, 
and  not  without  a  wish  to  make  her  mother  repent. 

"  Very  well,  dictator !  "  said  Ben,  contemptu- 
ously. "But  that  isn't  a  good  word:  he  didn't 
tell  them  to  write  on  slates. " 

"  Come,  come,  Ben,  you  are  not  so  ignorant  as 
that, "  said  Mrs.  Garth,  carefully  serious.  "  Hark, 
there  is  a  knock  at  the  door!  Bun,  Letty,  and 
open  it. " 

The  knock  was  Fred's ;  and  when  Letty  said  that 
her  father  was  not  in  yet,  but  that  her  mother  was 
in  the  kitchen,  Fred  had  no  alternative.  He  could 
not  depart  from  his  usual  practice  of  going  to  see 
Mrs.  Garth  in  the  kitchen  if  she  happened  to  be  at 
work  there.  He  put  his  arm  round  Letty 's  neck 
silently,  and  led  her  into  the  kitchen  without  his 
usual  jokes  and  caresses. 

Mrs.  Garth  was  surprised  to  see  Fred  at  this 
hour,  but  surprise  was  not  a  feeling  that  she  was 
VOL.  i.  —  22 


338  MIDDLEMARCH. 

given  to  express,  and  she  only  said,  quietly  con- 
tinuing her  work,  — 

"  You,  Fred,  so  early  in  the  day  ?  You  look 
quite  pale.  Has  anything  happened  ?  " 

"  I  want  to  speak  to  Mr.  Garth, "  said  Fred,  not 
yet  ready  to  say  more,  — "  and  to  you  also, "  he 
added,  after  a  little  pause,  for  he  had  no  doubt 
that  Mrs.  Garth  knew  everything  about  the  bill, 
and  he  must  in  the  end  speak  of  it  before  her,  if 
not  to  her  solely. 

"  Caleb  will  be  in  again  in  a  few  minutes, "  said 
Mrs.  Garth,  who  imagined  some  trouble  between 
Fred  and  his  father.  "  He  is  sure  not  to  be  long, 
because  he  has  some  work  at  his  desk  that  must  be 
done  this  morning.  Do  you  mind  staying  with 
me,  while  I  finish  my  matters  here  ?  " 

"  But  we  needn't  go  on  about  Cincinnatus,  need 
we  ?  "  said  Ben,  who  had  taken  Fred's  whip  out 
of  his  hand,  and  was  trying  its  efficiency  on  the 
cat. 

"  No,  go  out  now.  But  put  that  whip  down. 
How  very  mean  of  you  to  whip  poor  old  Tortoise ! 
Pray  take  the  whip  from  him,  Fred. " 

"  Come,  old  boy,  give  it  me, "  said  Fred,  putting 
out  his  hand. 

"  Will  you  let  me  ride  on  your  horse  to-day  ? " 
said  Ben,  rendering  up  the  whip  with  an  air  of 
not  being  obliged  to  do  it. 

"  Not  to-day,  —  another  time.  I  am  not  riding 
my  own  horse. " 

"  Shall  you  see  Mary  to-day  ?  " 

"  Yes,  I  think  so, "  said  Fred,  with  an  unpleasant 
twinge. 

"  Tell  her  to  come  home  soon,  and  play  at  for- 
feits, and  make  fun. " 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  339 

"  Enough,  enough,  Ben !  run  away !  *  said  Mrs. 
Garth,  seeing  that  Fred  was  teased. 

"  Are  Letty  and  Ben  your  only  pupils  now,  Mrs. 
Garth  ? "  said  Fred,  when  the  children  were  gone 
and  it  was  needful  to  say  something  that  would 
pass  the  time.  He  was  not  yet  sure  whether  he 
should  wait  for  Mr.  Garth,  or  use  any  good  oppor- 
tunity in  conversation  to  confess  to  Mrs.  Garth 
herself,  give  her  the  money,  and  ride  away. 

"  One,  —  only  one.  Fanny  Hackbutt  comes  at 
half -past  eleven.  I  am  not  getting  a  great  income 
now, "  said  Mrs.  Garth,  smiling.  "  I  am  at  a  low 
ebb.  with  pupils.  But  I  have  saved  my  little  purse 
for  Alfred's  premium:  I  have  ninety-two  pounds. 
He  can  go  to  Mr.  Hanmer's  now ;  he  is  just  at  the 
right  age.  " 

This  did  not  lead  well  towards  the  news  that 
Mr.  Garth  was  on  the  brink  of  losing  ninety-two 
pounds  and  more.  Fred  was  silent.  "  Young  gen- 
tlemen who  go  to  college  are  rather  more  costly 
than  that, "  Mrs.  Garth  innocently  continued,  pull- 
ing out  the  edging  on  a  cap-border.  "  And  Caleb 
thinks  that  Alfred  will  turn  out  a  distinguished 
engineer :  he  wants  to  give  the  boy  a  good  chance. 
There  he  is !  I  hear  him  coming  in.  We  will  go 
to  him  in  the  parlour,  shall  we  ?  " 

When  they  entered  the  parlour,  Caleb  had  thrown 
down  his  hat  and  was  seated  at  his  desk. 

"  What !  Fred,  my  boy ! "  he  said,  in  a  tone  of 
mild  surprise,  holding  his  pen  still  undipped ; 
"  you  are  here  betimes. "  But  missing  the  usual 
expression  of  cheerful  greeting  in  Fred's  face,  he 
immediately  added,  "  Is  there  anything  up  at 
home  ?  —  anything  the  matter  ?  " 

"  Yes,  Mr.   Garth,  I  am  come  to  tell  something 


340  MIDDLEMA.RCII. 

that  I  am  afraid  will  give  you  a  bad  opinion  of  me. 
I  am  come  to  tell  you  and  Mrs.  Garth  that  I  can't 
keep  my  word.  I  can't  find  the  money  to  meet  the 
bill,  after  all.  I  have  been  unfortunate ;  I  have 
only  got  these  fifty  pounds  towards  the  hundred 
and  sixty. " 

While  Fred  was  speaking,  he  had  taken  out  the 
notes  and  laid  them  on  the  desk  before  Mr.  Garth. 
He  had  burst  forth  at  once  with  the  plain  fact, 
feeling  boyishly  miserable  and  without  verbal  re- 
sources. Mrs.  Garth  was  mutely  astonished,  and 
looked  at  her  husband  for  an  explanation.  Caleb 
blushed,  and  after  a  little  pause  said,  — 

"  Oh,  I  didn't  tell  you,  Susan:  I  put  my  name 
to  a  bill  for  Fred ;  it  was  for  a  hundred  and  sixty 
pounds.  He  made  sure  he  could  meet  it  himself. " 

There  was  an  evident  change  in  Mrs.  Garth's 
face,  but  it  was  like  a  change  below  the  surface  of 
water  which  remains-  smooth.  She  fixed  her  eyes 
on  Fred,  saying,  — 

"  I  suppose  you  have  asked  your  father  for  the 
rest  of  the  money  and  he  has  refused  you. " 

"  No, "  said  Fred,  biting  his  lip,  and  speaking 
with  more  difficulty  ;  "  but  I  know  it  will  be  of  no 
use  to  ask  him ;  and  unless  it  were  of  use,  I  should 
not  like  to  mention  Mr.  Garth's  name  in  the 
matter. " 

"  It  has  come  at  an  unfortunate  time, "  said 
Caleb,  in  his  hesitating  way,  looking  down  at  the 
notes  and  nervously  fingering  the  paper,  "  Christ- 
mas upon  us  —  I'm  rather  hard  up  just  now.  You 
see,  I  have  to  cut  out  everything  like  a  tailor  with 
short  measure.  What  can  we  do,  Susan  ?  I  shall 
want  every  farthing  we  have  in  the  bank.  It 's  a 
hundred  and  ten  pounds,  the  deuce  take  it !  " 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  341 

*  I  must  give  you  the  ninety-two  pounds  that 
I  have  put  by  for  Alfred's  premium, "  said  Mrs. 
Garth,  gravely  and  decisively,  though  a  nice  ear 
might  have  discerned  a  slight  tremour  in  some  of 
the  words.  "  And  I  have  no  doubt  that  Mary  has 
twenty  pounds  saved  from  her  salary  by  this  time. 
She  will  advance  it.  " 

Mrs.  Garth  had  not  again  looked  at  Fred,  and 
was  not  in  the  least  calculating  what  words  she 
should  use  to  cut  him  the  most  effectively.  Like 
the  eccentric  woman  she  was,  she  was  at  present 
absorbed  in  considering  what  was  to  be  done,  and 
did  not  fancy  that  the  end  could  be  better  achieved 
by  bitter  remarks  or  explosions.  But  she  had  made 
Fred  feel  for  the  first  time  something  like  the  tooth 
of  remorse.  Curiously  enough,  his  pain  in  the 
affair  beforehand  had  consisted  almost  entirely  in 
the  sense  that  he  must  seem  dishonourable  and  sink 
in  the  opinion  of  the  Garths :  he  had  not  occupied 
himself  with  the  inconvenience  and  possible  injury 
that  his  breach  might  occasion  them,  for  this  exer- 
cise of  the  imagination  on  other  people's  needs  is 
not  common  with  hopeful  young  gentlemen.  In- 
deed we  are  most  of  us  brought  up  in  the  notion 
that  the  highest  motive  for  not  doing  a  wrong  is 
something  irrespective  of  the  beings  who  would 
suffer  the  wrong.  But  at  this  moment  he  sud- 
denly saw  himself  as  a  pitiful  rascal  who  was 
robbing  two  women  of  their  savings. 

"  I  shall  certainly  pay  it  all,  Mrs.  Garth,  — • 
ultimately, "  he  stammered  out. 

"  Yes,  ultimately, "  said  Mrs.  Garth,  who  having 
a  special  dislike  to  fine  words  on  ugly  occasions 
could  not  now  repress  an  epigram.  "  But  boys  can- 
not well  be  apprenticed  ultimately  :  they  should  be 


342  MIDDLEMARCH. 

apprenticed   at  fifteen. "     She  had  never  been  so 
little  inclined  to  make  excuses  for  Fred. 

"  I  was  the  most  in  the  wrong,  Susan, "  said 
Caleb.  "  Fred  made  sure  of  finding  the  money. 
But  I  'd  no  business  to  be  fingering  bills.  I  sup- 
pose you  have  looked  all  round  and  tried  all  honest 
means  ?  "  he  added,  fixing  his  merciful  gray  eyes 
on  Fred.  Caleb  was  too  delicate  to  specify  Mr. 
Featherstone. 

"  Yes,  I  have  tried  everything,  —  I  really  have. 
I  should  have  had  a  hundred  and  thirty  pounds 
ready  but  for  a  misfortune  with  a  horse  which  I 
was  about  to  sell.  My  uncle  had  given  me  eighty 
pounds,  and  I  paid  away  thirty  with  my  old  horse 
in  order  to  get  another  which  I  was  going  to  sell 
for  eighty  or  more  —  I  meant  to  go  without  a  horse 
—  but  now  it  has  turned  out  vicious  and  lamed 
itself.  I  wish  I  and  the  horses  too  had  been  at  the 
devil,  before  I  had  brought  this  on  you.  There  's 
no  one  else  I  care  so  much  for :  you  and  Mrs. 
Garth  have  always  been  so  kind  to  me.  How- 
ever, it 's  no  use  saying  that.  You  will  always 
think  me  a  rascal  now. " 

Fred  turned  round  and  hurried  out  of  the  room, 
conscious  that  he  was  getting  rather  womanish, 
and  feeling  confusedly  that  his  being  sorry  was 
not  of  much  use  to  the  Garths.  They  could  see 
him  mount,  and  quickly  pass  through  the  gate. 

"  I  am  disappointed  in  Fred  Vincy, "  said  Mrs. 
Garth.  "  I  would  not  have  believed  beforehand 
that  he  would  have  drawn  you  into  his  debts.  I 
knew  he  was  extravagant,  but  I  did  not  think  that 
he  would  be  so  mean  as  to  hang  his  risks  on  his 
oldest  friend,  who  could  the  least  afford  to  lose. " 

"  I  was  a  fool,  Susan.  " 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  343 

•  "That  you  were,"  said  the  wife,  nodding  and 
smiling.  "  But  1  should  not  have  gone  to  publish 
it  in  the  market-place.  Why  should  you  keep  such 
things  from  me  ?  It  is  just  so  with  your  buttons  : 
you  let  them  burst  off  without  telling  me,  and  go 
out  with  your  wristband  hanging.  If  I  had  only 
known  I  might  have  been  ready  with  some  better 
plan. " 

"  You  are  sadly  cut  up,  I  know,  Susan, "  said 
Caleb,  looking  feelingly  at  her.  "  I  can't  abide 
your  losing  the  money  you  've  scraped  together  for 
Alfred. " 

"  It  is  very  well  that  I  had  scraped  it  together ; 
and  it  is  you  who  will  have  to  suffer,  for  you 
must  teach  the  boy  yourself.  You  must  give  up 
your  bad  habits.  Some  men  take  to  drinking,  and 
you  have  taken  to  working  without  pay.  You 
must  indulge  yourself  a  little  less  in  that.  And 
you  must  ride  over  to  Mary,  and  ask  the  child 
what  money  she  has.  " 

Caleb  had  pushed  his  chair  back,  and  was  lean- 
ing forward,  shaking  his  head  slowly,  and  fitting 
his  finger-tips  together  with  much  nicety. 

"  Poor  Mary !  "  he  said.  "  Susan, "  he  went  on 
in  a  lowered  tone,  "  I'm  afraid  she  may  be  fond  of 
Fred.  " 

"  Oh,  no !  She  always  laughs  at  him ;  and  he  is 
not  likely  to  think  of  her  in  any  other  than  a 
brotherly  way. " 

Caleb  made  no  rejoinder,  but  presently  lowered 
his  spectacles,  drew  up  his  chair  to  the  desk,  and 
said  :  "  Deuce  take  the  bill, —  I  wish  it  was  at 
Hanover !  These  things  are  a  sad  interruption  to 
business !  " 

The  first  part  of  this  speech  comprised  his  whole 


344  MIDDLEMARCH. 

store  of  maledictory  expression,  and  was  uttered 
with  a  slight  snarl  easy  to  imagine.  But  it  would 
be  difficult  to  convey  to  those  who  never  heard  him 
utter  the  word  "  business, "  the  peculiar  tone  of 
fervid  veneration,  of  religious  regard,  in  which  he 
wrapped  it,  as  a  consecrated  symbol  is  wrapped  in 
its  gold-fringed  linen. 

Caleb  Garth  often  shook  his  head  in  meditation  on 
the  value,  the  indispensable  might  of  that  myriad- 
headed,  myriad-handed  labour  by  which  the  social 
body  is  fed,  clothed,  and  housed.  It  had  laid  hold 
of  his  imagination  in  boyhood.  The  echoes  of  the 
great  hammer  where  roof  or  keel  was  a-making, 
the  signal-shouts  of  the  workmen,  the  roar  of  the 
furnace,  the  thunder  and  plash  of  the  engine,  were 
a  sublime  music  to  him;  the  felling  and  lading  of 
timber,  and  the  huge  trunk  vibrating  star-like  in 
the  distance  along  the  highway,  the  crane  at  work 
on  the  wharf,  the  piled-up  produce  in  warehouses, 
the  precision  and  variety  of  muscular  effort  wher- 
ever exact  work  had  to  be  turned  out,  —  all  these 
sights  of  his  youth  had  acted  on  him  as  poetry 
without  the  aid  of  the  poets,  had  made  a  philo- 
sophy for  him  without  the  aid  of  philosophers,  a 
religion  without  the  aid  of  theology.  His  early 
ambition  had  been  to  have  as  effective  a  share  as 
possible  in  this  sublime  labour,  which  was  pecu- 
liarly dignified  by  him  with  the  name  of  "  busi- 
ness ;  "  and  though  he  had  only  been  a  short  time 
under  a  surveyor,  and  had  been  chiefly  his  own 
teacher,  he  knew  more  of  land,  building,  and  min- 
ing than  most  of  the  special  men  in  the  county. 

His  classification  of  human  employments  was 
rather  crude,  and,  like  the  categories  of  more  cele- 
brated men,  would  not  be  acceptable  in  these 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  345 

advanced  times.  He  divided  them  into  "  business, 
politics,  preaching,  learning,  and  amusement. " 
He  had  nothing  to  say  against  the  last  four ;  but 
he  regarded  them  as  a  reverential  pagan  regarded 
other  gods  than  his  own.  In  the  same  way  he 
thought  very  well  of  all  ranks,  but  he  would  not 
himself  have  liked  to  be  of  any  rank  in  which  he 
had  not  such  close  contact  with  "  business"  as  to 
get  often  honourably  decorated  with  marks  of  dust 
and  mortar,  the  damp  of  the  engine,  or  the  sweet 
soil  of  the  woods  and  fields.  Though  he  had  never 
regarded  himself  as  other  than  an  Orthodox  Chris- 
tian, and  would  argue  on  prevenient  grace  if  the 
subject  were  proposed  to  him,  I  think  his  virtual 
divinities  were  good  practical  schemes,  accurate 
work,  and  the  faithful  completion  of  undertakings  : 
his  prince  of  darkness  was  a  slack  workman.  But 
there  was  no  spirit  of  denial  in  Caleb,  and  the 
world  seemed  so  wondrous  to  him  that  he  was 
ready  to  accept  any  number  of  systems,  like  any 
number  of  firmaments,  if  they  did  not  obviously 
interfere  with  the  best  land-drainage,  solid  build- 
ing, correct  measuring,  and  judicious  boring  (for 
coal).  In  fact,  he  had  a  reverential  soul  with  a 
strong  practical  intelligence.  But  he  could  not 
manage  finance :  he  knew  values  well,  but  he  had 
no  keenness  of  imagination  for  monetary  results 
in  the  shape  of  profit  and  loss :  and  having  ascer- 
tained this  to  his  cost,  he  determined  to  give  up 
all  forms  of  his  beloved  "  business"  which  required 
that  talent.  He  gave  himself  up  entirely  to  the 
many  kinds  of  work  which  he  could  do  without 
handling  capital,  and  was  one  of  those  precious 
men  within  his  own  district  whom  everybody 


346  MIDDLEMARCH. 

would  choose  to  work  for  them,  because  he  did  his 
work  well,  charged  very  little,  and  often  declined 
to  charge  at  all.  It  is  no  wonder,  then,  that  the 
Garths  were  poor,  and  "  lived  in  a  small  way. " 
However,  they  did  not  mind  it. 


CHAPTEK  XXV. 

Love  seeketh  not  itself  to  please, 

Nor  for  itself  hath  any  care, 
But  for  another  gives  its  ease, 

And  builds  a  heaven  in  hell's  despair. 

Love  seeketh  only  self  to  please, 

To  bind  another  to  its  delight, 
Joys  in  another's  loss  of  ease, 

And  builds  a  hell  in  heaven's  despite. 

W.  BLAKE  :  Songs  of  Experience, 

FRED  VINCY  wanted  to  arrive  at  Stone  Court  when 
Mary  could  not  expect  him,  and  when  his  uncle 
was  not  downstairs :  in  that  case  she  might  be  sit- 
ting alone  in  the  wainscoted  parlour.  He  left  his 
horse  in  the  yard  to  avoid  making  a  noise  on  the 
gravel  in  front,  and  entered  the  parlour  without 
other  notice  than  the  noise  of  the  door-handle. 
Mary  was  in  her  usual  corner,  laughing  over  Mrs. 
Piozzi's  recollections  of  Johnson,  and  looked  up 
with  the  fun  still  in  her  face.  It  gradually  faded 
as  she  saw  Fred  approach  her  without  speaking, 
and  stand  before  her  with  his  elbow  on  the  mantel- 
piece, looking  ill.  She  too  was  silent,  only  raising 
her  eyes  to  him  inquiringly. 

"  Mary, "  he  began,  "  I  am  a  good-for-nothing 
blackguard. " 

"  I  should  think  one  of  those  epithets  would  do 
at  a  time, "  said  Mary,  trying  to  smile,  but  feeling 
alarmed. 

"  I  know  you  will  never  think  well  .of  me  any 
more.  You  will  think  me  a  liar.  You  will  think 


348  MIDDLEMARCH. 

me  dishonest.  You  will  think  I  didn't  care  for 
you,  or  your  father  and  mother.  You  always  do 
make  the  worst  of  me,  I  know. " 

"  I  cannot  deny  that  I  shall  think  all  that  of 
you,  Fred,  if  you  give  me  good  reasons.  But  please 
to  tell  me  at  once  what  you  have  done.  I  would 
rather  know  the  painful  truth  than  imagine  it.  " 

"  I  owed  money,  —  a  hundred  and  sixty  pounds. 
I  asked  your  father  to  put  his  name  to  a  bill.  I 
thought  it  would  not  signify  to  him.  I  made  sure 
of  paying  the  money  myself,  and  I  have  tried  as 
hard  as  I  could.  And  now,  I  have  been  so  unlucky 
—  a  horse  has  turned  out  badly  —  I  can  only  pay 
fifty  pounds.  And  I  can't  ask  my  father  for  the 
money :  he  would  not  give  me  a  farthing.  And 
my  uncle  gave  me  a  hundred  a  little  while  ago. 
So  what  can  I  do  ?  And  now  your  father  has  no 
ready  money  to  spare,  and  your  mother  will  have 
to  pay  away  her  ninety-two  pounds  that  she  has 
saved,  and  she  says  your  savings  must  go  too.  You 
see  what  a  —  " 

"  Oh,  poor  mother,  poor  father !  "  said  Mary,  her 
eyes  filling  with  tears,  and  a  little  sob  rising  which 
she  tried  to  repress.  She  looked  straight  before 
her  and  took  no  notice  of  Fred,  all  the  conse- 
quences at  home  becoming  present  to  her.  He  too 
remained  silent  for  some  moments,  feeling  more 
miserable  than  ever. 

"I  wouldn't  have  hurt  you  so  for  the  world, 
Mary, "  he  said  at  last.  "  You  can  never  forgive 
me." 

"  What  does  it  matter  whether  I  forgive  you  ?  " 
said  Mary,  passionately.  "  Would  that  make  it 
any  better  for  my  mother  to  lose  the  money  she 
has  been  earning  by  lessons  for  four  years,  that  she 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  349 

might  send  Alfred  to  Mr.  Hanmer's  ?  Should  you 
think  all  that  pleasant  enough  if  I  forgave  you  ?  " 

"  Say  what  you  like,  Mary.     I  deserve  it  all. " 

"I  don't  want  to  say  anything,"  said  Mary, 
more  quietly ;  "  my  anger  is  of  no  use.  "  She  dried 
her  eyes,  threw  aside  her  book,  rose,  and  fetched 
her  sewing. 

Fred  followed  her  with  his  eyes,  hoping  that 
they  would  meet  hers,  and  in  that  way  find  access 
for  his  imploring  penitence.  But  no !  Mary  could 
easily  avoid  looking  upward. 

"  I  do  care  about  your  mother's  money  going, " 
he  said,  when  she  was  seated  again  and  sewing 
quickly.  "I  wanted  to  ask  you,  Mary  —  don't 
you  think  that  Mr.  Featherstone  —  if  you  were  to 
tell  him  —  tell  him,  I  mean,  about  apprenticing 
Alfred  —  would  advance  the  money  ?  " 

"  My  family  is  not  fond  of  begging,  Fred.  We 
would  rather  work  for  our  money.  Besides,  you 
say  that  Mr.  Featherstone  has  lately  given  you  a 
hundred  pounds.  He  rarely  makes  presents;  he 
has  never  made  presents  to  us.  I  am  sure  my 
father  will  not  ask  him  for  anything ;  and  even  if 
I  chose  to  beg  of  him,  it  would  be  of  no  use. " 

"  I  am  so  miserable,  Mary,  —  if  you  knew  how 
miserable  I  am,  you  would  be  sorry  for  me. " 

"  There  are  other  things  to  be  more  sorry  for  than 
that.  But  selfish  people  always  think  their  own 
discomfort  of  more  importance  than  anything  else 
in  the  world :  I  see  enough  of  that  every  day.  " 

"  It  is  hardly  fair  to  call  me  selfish.  If  you 
knew  what  things  other  young  men  do,  you  would 
think  me  a  good  way  off  the  worst. " 

"  I  know  that  people  who  spend  a  great  deal  of 
money  on  themselves  without  knowing  how  they 


35°  MIDDLEMAKCH. 

shall  pay,  must  be  selfish.  They  are  always  think- 
ing of  what  they  can  get  for  themselves,  and  not  of 
what  other  people  may  lose.  " 

"  Any  man  may  be  unfortunate,  Mary,  and  find 
himself  unable  to  pay  when  he  meant  it.  There  is 
not  a  better  man  in  the  world  than  your  father, 
and  yet  he  got  into  trouble.  " 

"  How  dare  you  make  any  comparison  between 
my  father  and  you,  Fred  ?  "  said  Mary,  in  a  deep 
tone  of  indignation.  "  He  never  got  into  trouble 
by  thinking  of  his  own  idle  pleasures,  but  because 
he  was  always  thinking  of  the  work  he  was  doing 
for  other  people.  And  he  has  fared  hard,  and 
worked  hard  to  make  good  everybody's  loss.  " 

"  And  you  think  that  I  shall  never  try  to  make 
good  anything,  Mary.  It  is  not  generous  to  believe 
the  worst  of  a  man.  When  you  have  got  any  power 
over  him,  I  think  you  might  try  and  use  it  to  make 
him  better ;  but  that  is  what  you  never  do.  How- 
ever, I  'm  going, "  Fred  ended  languidly.  "  I  shall 
never  speak  to  you  about  anything  again.  I  'm 
very  sorry  for  all  the  trouble  I  've  caused,  —  that 's 
all." 

Mary  had  dropped  her  work  out  of  her  hand  and 
looked  up.  There  is  often  something  maternal 
even  in  a  girlish  love,  and  Mary's  hard  experience 
had  wrought  her  nature  to  an  impressibility  very 
different  from  that  hard  slight  thing  which  we  call 
girlishness.  At  Fred's  last  words  she  felt  an  in- 
stantaneous pang,  something  like  what  a  mother 
feels  at  the  imagined  sobs  or  cries  of  her  naughty 
truant  child,  which  may  lose  itself  and  get  harm. 
And  when,  looking  up,  her  eyes  met  his  dull  de- 
spairing glance,  her  pity  for  him  surmounted  her 
anger  and  all  her  other  anxieties. 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  351 

"  Oh,  Fred,  how  ill  you  look !  Sit  down  a 
moment.  Don't  go  yet.  Let  me  tell  uncle  that 
you  are  here.  He  has  been  wondering  that  he  has 
not  seen  you  for  a  whole  week. "  Mary  spoke 
hurriedly,  saying  the  words  that  came  first  without 
knowing  very  well  what  they  were,  but  saying  them 
in  a  half -soothing,  half-beseeching  tone,  and  rising 
as  if  to  go  away  to  Mr.  Featherstone.  Of  course 
Fred  felt  as  if  the  clouds  had  parted  and  a  gleam 
had  come :  he  moved  and  stood  in  her  way. 

"  Say  one  word,  Mary,  and  I  will  do  anything. 
Say  you  will  not  think  the  worst  of  me,  —  will  not 
give  me  up  altogether.  " 

"  As  if  it  were  any  pleasure  to  me  to  think  ill  of 
you, "  said  Mary,  in  a  mournful  tone.  "  As  if  it 
were  not  very  painful  to  me  to  see  you  an  idle  friv- 
olous creature.  How  can  you  bear  to  be  so  con- 
temptible, when  others  are  working  and  striving, 
and  there  are  so  many  things  to  be  done,  —  how 
can  you  bear  to  be  fit  for  nothing  in  the  world  that 
is  useful  ?  And  with  so  much  good  in  your  dis- 
position, Fred,  —  you  might  be  worth  a  great 
deal. " 

"  I  will  try  to  be  anything  you  like,  Mary,  if 
you  will  say  that  you  love  me.  " 

"  I  should  be  ashamed  to  say  that  I  loved  a  man 
who  must  always  be  hanging  on  others,  and  reckon- 
ing on  what  they  would  do  for  him.  What  will 
you  be  when  you  are  forty  ?  Like  Mr.  Bowyer,  I 
suppose  —  just  as  idle,  living  in  Mrs.  Beck's  front 
parlour  —  fat  and  shabby,  hoping  somebody  will 
invite  you  to  dinner  —  spending  your  morning  in 
learning  a  comic  song  —  oh,  no !  learning  a  tune  on 
the  flute. " 

Mary's  lips  had  begun  to  curl  with  a  smile  as 


352  MIDDLEMARCH. 

soon  as  she  had  asked  that  question  about  Fred's 
future  (young  souls  are  mobile),  and  before  she 
ended,  her  face  had  its  full  illumination  of  fun. 
To  him  it  was  like  the  cessation  of  an  ache  that 
Mary  could  laugh  at  him,  and  with  a  passive  sort 
of  smile  he  tried  to  reach  her  hand;  but  she 
slipped  away  quickly  towards  the  door  and  said, 
"  I  shall  tell  uncle.  You  must  see  him  for  a 
moment  or  two. " 

Fred  secretly  felt  that  his  future  was  guaranteed 
against  the  fulfilment  of  Mary's  sarcastic  pro- 
phecies, apart  from  that  "  anything"  which  he  was 
ready  to  do  if  she  would  define  it.  He  never 
dared  in  Mary's  presence  to  approach  the  subject 
of  his  expectations  from  Mr.  Featherstone,  and  she 
always  ignored  them,  as  if  everything  depended  on 
himself.  But  if  ever  he  actually  came  into  the 
property,  she  must  recognize  the  change  in  his 
position.  All  this  passed  through  his  mind  some- 
what languidly,  before  he  went  up  to  see  his 
uncle.  He  stayed  but  a  little  while,  excusing 
himself  on  the  ground  that  he  had  a  cold ;  and 
Mary  did  not  reappear  before  he  left  the  house. 
But  as  he  rode  home,  he  began  to  be  more  con- 
scious of  being  ill  than  of  being  melancholy. 

When  Caleb  Garth  arrived  at  Stone  Court  soon 
after  dusk,  Mary  was  not  surprised,  although  he 
seldom  had  leisure  for  paying  her  a  visit,  and  was 
not  at  all  fond  of  having  to  talk  with  Mr.  Feather- 
stone.  The  old  man,  on  the  other  hand,  felt  him- 
self ill  at  ease  with  a  brother-in-law  whom  he 
could  not  annoy,  who  did  not  mind  about  being 
considered  poor,  had  nothing  to  ask  of  him,  and 
understood  all  kinds  of  farming  and  mining  busi- 
ness better  than  he  did.  But  Marv  had  felt  sure 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  353 

that  her  parents  would  want  to  see  her,  and  if  her 
father  had  not  come,  she  would  have  obtained 
leave  to  go  home  for  an  hour  or  two  the  next  day. 
After  discussing  prices  during  tea  with  Mr.  Feather- 
stone,  Caleb  rose  to  bid  him  good-by,  and  said,  "  I 
want  to  speak  to  you,  Mary.  " 

She  took  a  candle  into  another  large  parlour, 
where  there  was  no  fire,  and  setting  down  the 
feeble  light  on  the  dark  mahogany  table,  turned 
round  to  her  father,  and  putting  her  arms  round 
his  neck  kissed  him  with  childish  kisses  which  he 
delighted  in, — the  expression  of  his  large  brows 
softening  as  the  expression  of  a  great  beautiful  dog 
softens  when  it  is  caressed.  Mary  was  his  favour- 
ite child  ;  and  whatever  Susan  might  say,  and  right 
as  she  was  on  all  other  subjects,  Caleb  thought  it 
natural  that  Fred  or  any  one  else  should  think 
Mary  more  lovable  than  other  girls. 

"  I  've  got  something  to  tell  you,  my  dear, "  said 
Caleb,  in  his  hesitating  way.  "  No  very  good 
news ;  but  then  it  might  be  worse. " 

"  About  money,  father  ?  I  think  I  know  what 
it  is." 

"  Ay  ?  how  can  that  be  ?  You  see,  I  've  been  a 
bit  of  a  fool  again,  and  put  my  name  to  a  bill,  and 
now  it  comes  to  paying ;  and  your  mother  has  got 
to  part  with  her  savings,  that 's  the  worst  of  it, 
and  even  they  won't  quite  make  things  even.  We 
wanted  a  hundred  and  ten  pounds :  your  mother 
has  ninety-two,  and  I  have  none  to  spare  in  the 
bank  ;  and  she  thinks  that  you  have  some  savings.  " 

"  Oh,  yes ;  I  have  more  than  four-and-twenty 
pounds.  I  thought  you  would  come,  father,  so  I 
put  it  in  my  bag.  See !  beautiful  white  notes  and 
gold." 

VOL.  I.  — 23 


354  MIDDLEMARCH. 

Mary  took  out  the  folded  money  from  her  reti- 
cule, and  put  it  into  her  father's  hand. 

"  Well,  but  how  —  we  only  want  eighteen  —  here, 
put  the  rest  back,  child  —  but  how  did  you  know 
about  it  ?  "  said  Caleb,  who,  in  his  unconquerable 
indifference  to  money,  was  beginning  to  be  chiefly 
concerned  about  the  relation  the  affair  might  have 
to  Mary's  affections. 

"  Fred  told  me  this  morning.  " 

"  Ah !     Did  he  come  on  purpose  ?  " 

"  Yes,  I  think  so.  He  was  a  good  deal  dis- 
tressed. " 

"  I  'm  afraid  Fred  is  not  to  be  trusted,  Mary, " 
said  the  father,  with  hesitating  tenderness.  "  He 
means  better  than  he  acts,  perhaps.  But  I  should 
think  it  a  pity  for  anybody's  happiness  to  be 
wrapped  up  in  him,  and  so  would  your  mother. " 

"  And  so  should  I,  father, "  said  Mary,  not  look- 
ing up,  but  putting  the  back  of  her  father's  hand 
against  her  cheek. 

"  I  don't  want  to  pry,  my  dear.  But  I  was 
afraid  there  might  be  something  between  you  and 
Fred,  and  I  wanted  to  caution  you.  You  see, 
Mary,"  —  here  Caleb's  voice  became  more  tender; 
he  had  been  pushing  his  hat  about  on  the  table 
and  looking  at  it,  but  finally  he  turned  his  eyes  on 
his  daughter,  —  "a  woman,  let  her  be  as  good  as 
she  may,  has  got  to  put  up  with  the  life  her  hus- 
band makes  for  her.  Your  mother  has  had  to  put 
up  with  a  good  deal  because  of  me. " 

Mary  turned  the  back  of  her  father's  hand  to  her 
lips  and  smiled  at  him. 

"  Well,  well,  nobody's  perfect;  but  "  — here  Mr. 
Garth  shook  his  head  to  help  out  the  inadequacy 
of  words  —  "  what  I  am  thinking  of  is  —  what  it 


WAITING  FOR   DEATH.  355 

must  be  for  a  wife  when  she's  never  sure  of  her 
husband,  when  he  has  n't  got  a  principle  in  him  to 
make  him  more  afraid  of  doing  the  wrong  thing 
by  others  than  of  getting  his  own  toes  pinched. 
That 's  the  long  and  the  short  of  it,  Mary.  Young 
folks  may  get  fond  of  each  other  before  they  know 
what  life  is,  and  they  may  think  it  all  holiday  if 
they  can  only  get  together ;  but  it  soon  turns  into 
working  day,  my  dear.  However,  you  have  more 
sense  than  most,  and  you  have  n't  been  kept  in 
cotton -wool :  there  may  be  no  occasion  for  me  to 
say  this,  but  a  father  trembles  for  his  daughter, 
and  you  are  all  by  yourself  here. " 

"  Don't  fear  for  me,  father,"  said  Mary,  gravely 
meeting  her  father's  eyes.  "  Fred  has  always  been 
very  good  to  me ;  he  is  kind-hearted  and  affec- 
tionate, and  not  false,  I  think,  with  all  his  self- 
indulgence.  But  I  will  never  engage  myself  to 
one  who  has  no  manly  independence,  and  who  goes 
on  loitering  away  his  time  on  the  chance  that 
others  will  provide  for  him.  You  and  my  mother 
have  taught  me  too  much  pride  for  that. " 

"  That 's  right,  —  that  's  right.  Then  I  am 
easy, "  said  Mr.  Garth,  taking  up  his  hat.  "  But 
it 's  hard  to  run  away  with  your  earnings,  child.  " 

"  Father !  "  said  Mary,  in  her  deepest  tone  of 
remonstrance.  "Take  pocketfuls  of  love  besides 
to  them  all  at  home, "  was  her  last  word  before  he 
closed  the  outer  door  on  himself. 

"  I  suppose  your  father  wanted  your  earnings, " 
said  old  Mr.  Featherstone,  with  his  usual  power 
of  unpleasant  surmise,  when  Mary  returned  to 
him.  "  He  makes  but  a  tight  fit,  I  reckon. 
You  're  of  age  now ;  you  ought  to  be  saving  for 
yourself. " 


356  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  I  consider  my  father  and  mother  the  best  part 
of  myself,  sir,"  said  Mary,  coldly. 

Mr.  Featherstone  grunted :  he  could  not  deny 
that  an  ordinary  sort  of  girl  like  her  might  be 
expected  to  be  useful,  so  he  thought  of  another 
rejoinder,  disagreeable  enough  to  be  always  apropos  : 
"  If  Fred  Vincy  comes  to-morrow,  now,  don't  you 
keep  him  chattering :  let  him  come  up  to  me. " 


CHAPTEE  XXVI. 

He  beats  me  and  T  rail  at  him :  0  worthy  satisfaction !  would 
it  were  otherwise,  —  that  I  could  beat  him  while  he  railed  at  me. — 
Troilus  and  Cressida. 

BUT  Fred  did  not  go  to  Stone  Court  the  next  day, 
for  reasons  that  were  quite  peremptory.  From 
those  visits  to  unsanitary  Houndsley  streets  in 
search  of  Diamond,  he  had  brought  back  not  only 
a  bad  bargain  in  horse-flesh,  but  the  further  mis- 
fortune of  some  ailment  which  for  a  day  or  two 
had  seemed  mere  depression  and  headache,  but 
which  got  so  much  worse  when  he  returned  from 
his  visit  to  Stone  Court  that,  going  into  the  dining- 
room,  he  threw  himself  on  the  sofa,  and  in  answer 
to  his  mother's  anxious  question,  said,  "  I  feel 
very  ill :  I  think  you  must  send  for  Wrench. " 

Wrench  came,  but  did  not  apprehend  anything 
serious,  spoke  of  a  "  slight  derangement, "  and  did 
not  speak  of  coming  again  on  the  morrow.  He  had 
a  due  value  for  the  Vincys'  house,  but  the  wariest 
men  are  apt  to  be  dulled  by  routine,  and  on  worried 
mornings  will  sometimes  go  through  their  business 
with  the  zest  of  the  daily  bell-ringer.  Mr.  Wrench 
was  a  small,  neat,  bilious  man,  with  a  well-dressed 
wig :  he  had  a  laborious  practice,  an  irascible  tem- 
per, a  lymphatic  wife ,  and  seven  children ;  and  he 
was  already  rather  late  before  setting  out  on  a  four- 
miles  drive  to  meet  Dr.  Minchin  on  the  other  side 
of  Tipton,  the  decease  of  Hicks,  a  rural  practi- 
tioner, having  increased  Middlemarch  practice  in 


358  MIDDLEMARCH. 

that  direction.  Great  statesmen  err,  and  why  not 
small  medical  men  ?  Mr.  Wrench  did  not  neglect 
sending  the  usual  white  parcels,  which  this  time 
had  black  and  drastic  contents.  Their  effect  was 
not  alleviating  to  poor  Fred,  who,  however,  un- 
willing as  he  said  to  believe  that  he  was  "  in  for 
an  illness,"  rose  at  his  usual  easy  hour  the  next 
morning  and  went  downstairs  meaning  to  break- 
fast, but  succeeded  in  nothing  but  in  sitting  and 
shivering  by  the  fire.  Mr.  Wrench  was  again  sent 
for,  but  was  gone  on  his  rounds ;  and  Mrs.  Vincy, 
seeing  her  darling's  changed  looks  and  general 
misery,  began  to  cry  and  said  she  would  send  for 
Dr.  Sprague. 

"  Oh,  nonsense,  mother !  It 's  nothing, "  said 
Fred,  putting  out  his  hot  dry  hand  to  her,  "  I  shall 
soon  be  all  right.  I  must  have  taken  cold  in  that 
nasty  damp  ride. " 

"  Mamma ! "  said  Eosamond,  who  was  seated 
near  the  window  (the  dining-room  windows  looked 
on  that  highly  respectable  street  called  Lowick 
Gate),  "  there  is  Mr.  Lydgate,  stopping  to  speak  to 
some  one.  If  I  were  you,  I  would  call  him  in. 
He  has  cured  Ellen  Bulstrode.  They  say  he  cures 
every  one. " 

Mrs.  Vincy  sprang  to  the  window  and  opened  it 
in  an  instant,  thinking  only  of  Fred  and  not  of 
medical  etiquette.  Lydgate  was  only  two  yards 
off  on  the  other  side  of  some  iron  palisading,  and 
turned  round  at  the  sudden  sound  of  the  sash, 
before  she  called  to  him.  In  two  minutes  he  was 
in  the  room,  and  Kosamond  went  out,  after  waiting 
just  long  enough  to  show  a  pretty  anxiety  conflict- 
ing with  her  sense  of  what  was  becoming. 

Lydgate  had  to  hear  a  narrative  in  which  Mrs. 


WAITING  FOB,  DEA.TH.  359 

Vincy's  mind  insisted  with  remarkable  instinct  on 
every  point  of  minor  importance,  especially  on  what 
Mr.  Wrench  had  said  and  had  not  said  about  com- 
ing again.  That  there  might  be  an  awkward  affair 
with  Wrench,  Lydgate  saw  at  once ;  but  the  case 
was  serious  enough  to  make  him  dismiss  that  con- 
sideration :  he  was  convinced  that  Fred  was  in  the 
pink-skinned  stage  of  typhoid  fever,  and  that  he 
had  taken  just  the  wrong  medicines.  He  must  go 
to  bed  immediately,  must  have  a  regular  nurse,  and 
various  appliances  and  precautions  must  be  used, 
about  which  Lydgate  was  particular.  Poor  Mrs. 
Vincy's  terror  at  these  indications  of  danger  found 
vent  in  such  words  as  came  most  easily.  She 
thought  it  "  very  ill  usage  on  the  part  of  Mr. 
Wrench,  who  had  attended  their  house  so  many 
years  in  preference  to  Mr.  Peacock,  though  Mr. 
Peacock  was  equally  a  friend.  Why  Mr.  Wrench 
should  neglect  her  children  more  than  others,  she 
could  not  for  the  life  of  her  understand.  He  had 
not  neglected  Mrs.  Larcher  s  when  they  had  the 
measles,  nor  indeed  would  Mrs.  Vincy  have  wished 
that  he  should.  And  if  anything  should  happen  — " 
Here  poor  Mrs.  Vincy's  spirit  quite  broke  down, 
and  her  Niobe  throat  and  good-humoured  face  were 
sadly  convulsed.  This  was  in  the  hall  out  of 
Fred's  hearing ;  but  Eosarnond  had  opened  the 
drawing-room  door,  and  now  came  forward  anx- 
iously. Lydgate  apologized  for  Mr.  Wrench,  said 
that  the  symptoms  yesterday  might  have  been  dis- 
guising, and  that  this  form  of  fever  was  very 
equivocal  in  its  beginnings  :  he  would  go  immedi- 
ately to  the  druggist's  and  have  a  prescription 
made  up  in  order  to  lose  no  time,  but  he  would 
write  to  Mr.  Wrench  and  tell  him  what  had  been 
done. 


360  MIDDLEMARCH. 

"  But  you  must  come  again,  —  you  must  go  on 
attending  Fred.  I  can't  have  my  boy  left  to  any- 
body who  may  come  or  not.  I  bear  nobody  ill- 
will,  thank  God,  and  Mr.  Wrench  saved  me  in  the 
pleurisy;  but  he 'd  better  have  let  me  die  —  if — • 
if—" 

"  I  will  meet  Mr  Wrench  here,  then,  shall  I  ?  " 
said  Lydgate,  really  believing  that  Wrench  was 
not  well  prepared  to  deal  wisely  with  a  case  of  this 
kind. 

"  Pray  make  that  arrangement,  Mr.  Lydgate, " 
said  Eosamond,  coming  to  her  mother's  aid,  and 
supporting  her  arm  to  lead  her  away. 

When  Mr.  Vincy  came  home  he  was  very  angry 
with  Wrench,  and  did  not  care  if  he  never  came 
into  his  house  again.  Lydgate  should  go  on  now, 
whether  Wrench  liked  it  or  not.  It  was  no  jdke 
to  have  fever  in  the  house.  Everybody  must  be 
sent  to  now  not  to  come  to  dinner  on  Thursday. 
And  Pritchard  need  n't  get  up  any  wine :  brandy 
was  the  best  thing  against  infection.  "  I  shall 
drink  brandy, "  added  Mr.  Vincy,  emphatically,  — 
as  much  as  to  say,  this  was  not  an  occasion  for 
firing  with  blank-cartridges.  "  He  's  an  uncom- 
monly unfortunate  lad,  is  Fred.  He  'd  need  have 
some  luck  by  and  by  to  make  up  for  all  this,  — 
else  I  don't  know  who  'd  have  an  eldest  son. " 

"  Don't  say  so,  Vincy,"  said  the  mother,  with  a 
quivering  lip,  "  if  you  don't  want  him  to  be  taken 
from  me. " 

"  It  will  worret  you  to  death,  Lucy ;  that  I  can 
see, "  said  Mr.  Vincy,  more  mildly.  "  However, 
Wrench  shall  know  what  I  think  of  the  matter. " 
(What  Mr.  Vincy  thought  confusedly  was,  that 
the  fever  might  somehow  have  been  hindered  if 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  361 

Wrench  had  shown  the  proper  solicitude  about  his 
—  the  Mayor's  —  family.)  "  I  'm  the  last  man  to 
give  in  to  the  cry  about  new  doctors,  or  new  par- 
sons either,  —  whether  they  're  Bulstrode's  men  or 
not.  But  Wrench  shall  know  what  I  think,  take 
it  as  he  will.  " 

Wrench  did  not  take  it  at  all  well.  Lydgate 
was  as  polite  as  he  could  be  in  his  offhand  way, 
but  politeness  in  a  man  who  has  placed  you  at  a 
disadvantage  is  only  an  additional  exasperation, 
especially  if  he  happens  to  have  been  an  object  of 
dislike  beforehand.  Country  practitioners  used  to 
be  an  irritable  species,  susceptible  on  the  point  of 
honour;  and  Mr.  Wrench  was  one  of  the  most 
irritable  among  them.  He  did  not  refuse  to  meet 
Lydgate  in  the  evening,  but  his  temper  was  some- 
what tried  on  the  occasion.  He  had  to  hear  Mrs. 
Vincy  say, — 

"  Oh,  Mr.  Wrench,  what  have  I  ever  done  that 
you  should  use  me  so  ?  —  To  go  away,  and  never 
to  come  again!  And  my  boy  might  have  been 
stretched  a  corpse !  " 

Mr.  Vincy,  who  had  been  keeping  up  a  sharp 
fire  on  the  enemy  Infection,  and  was  a  good  deal 
heated  in  consequence,  started  up  when  he  heard 
Wrench  come  in,  and  went  into  the  hall  to  let  him 
know  what  he  thought 

"  I  '11  tell  you  what,  Wrench,  this  is  beyond  a 
joke,"  said  the  Mayor,  who  of  late  had  had  to 
rebuke  offenders  with  an  official  air,  and  now 
broadened  himself  by  putting  his  thumbs  in  his 
armholes.  "  To  let  fever  get  unawares  into  a 
house  like  this.  There  are  some  things  that  ought 
to  be  actionable,  and  are  not  so,  —  that 's  my 
opinion, " 


362  M1DDLEMARCH. 

But  irrational  reproaches  were  easier  to  bear 
than  the  sense  of  being  instructed,  or  rather  the 
sense  that  a  younger  man,  like  Lydgate,  inwardly 
considered  him  in  need  of  instruction,  for  "  in 
point  of  fact, "  Mr.  Wrench  afterwards  said,  Lyd- 
gate paraded  flighty,  foreign  notions,  which  would 
not  wear.  He  swallowed  his  ire  for  the  moment, 
but  he  afterwards  wrote  to  decline  further  attend- 
ance in  the  case.  The  house  might  be  a  good  one, 
but  Mr.  Wrench  was  not  going  to  truckle  to  any- 
body on  a  professional  matter.  He  reflected,  with 
much  probability  on  his  side,  that  Lydgate  would 
by  and  by  be  caught  tripping  too,  and  that  his  un- 
gentlemanly  attempts  to  discredit  the  sale  of  drugs 
by  his  professional  brethren  would  by  and  by 
recoil  on  himself.  He  threw  out  biting  remarks 
on  Lydgate 's  tricks,  worthy  only  of  a  quack,  to  get 
himself  a  factitious  reputation  with  credulous  peo- 
ple. That  cant  about  cures  was  never  got  up  by 
sound  practitioners. 

This  was  a  point  on  which  Lydgate  smarted  as 
much  as  Wrench  could  desire.  To  be  puffed  by 
ignorance  was  not  only  humiliating  but  perilous, 
and  not  more  enviable  than  the  reputation  of  the 
weather-prophet.  He  was  impatient  of  the  foolish 
expectations  amidst  which  all  work  must  be  carried 
on,  and  likely  enough  to  damage  himself  as  much 
as  Mr.  Wrench  could  wish,  by  an  unprofessional 
openness. 

However,  Lydgate  was  installed  as  medical 
attendant  on  the  Vincys,  and  the  event  was  a  sub- 
ject of  general  conversation  in  Middlemarch.  Some 
said  that  the  Vincys  had  behaved  scandalously, 
that  Mr.  Vincy  had  threatened  Wrench,  and  that 
Mrs.  Vincy  had  accused  him  of  poisoning  her  son. 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  363 

Others  were  of  opinion  that  Mr.  Lydgate's  passing 
by  was  providential,  that  he  was  wonderfully 
clever  in  fevers,  and  that  Bulstrode  was  in  the 
right  to  bring  him  forward.  Many  people  believed 
that  Lydgate's  coming  to  the  town  at  all  was 
really  due  to  Bulstrode ;  and  Mrs.  Taft,  who  was 
always  counting  stitches  and  gathered  her  informa- 
tion in  misleading  fragments  caught  between  the 
rows  of  her  knitting,  had  got  it  into  her  head  that 
Mr.  Lydgate  was  a  natural  son  of  Bulstrode's,  a 
fact  which  seemed  to  justify  her  suspicions  of 
evangelical  laymen. 

She  one  day  communicated  this  piece  of  knowl- 
edge to  Mrs.  Farebrother,  who  did  not  fail  to  tell 
her  son  of  it,  observing, — • 

"  I  should  not  be  surprised  at  anything  in  Bul- 
strode, but  I  should  be  sorry  to  think  it  of  Mr. 
Lydgate. " 

"  Why,  mother, "  said  Mr.  Farebrother,  after  an 
explosive  laugh,  "  you  know  very  well  that  Lyd- 
gate is  of  a  good  family  in  the  North.  He  never 
heard  of  Bulstrode  before  he  came  here. " 

"  That  is  satisfactory  so  far  as  Mr.  Lydgate  is 
concerned,  Camden, "  said  the  old  lady,  with  an 
air  of  precision.  "  But  as  to  Bulstrode  —  the  re- 
port may  be  true  of  some  other  son. " 


CHAPTEE  XXVIL 

"  Let  the  high  Muse  chant  loves  Olympian : 
We  are  but  mortals,  and  must  sing  of  man." 

AN  eminent  philosopher  among  my  friends,  who 
can  dignify  even  your  ugly  furniture  by  lifting  it 
into  the  serene  light  of  science,  has  shown  me  this 
pregnant  little  fact.  Your  pier-glass  or  extensive 
surface  of  polished  steel  made  to  be  rubbed  by  a 
housemaid,  will  be  minutely  and  multitudinously 
scratched  in  all  directions ;  but  place  now  against 
it  a  lighted  candle  as  a  centre  of  illumination,  and 
lo !  the  scratches  will  seem  to  arrange  themselves 
in  a  fine  series  of  concentric  circles  round  that  lit- 
tle sun.  It  is  demonstrable  that  the  scratches  are 
going  everywhere  impartially,  and  it  is  only  your 
candle  which  produces  the  flattering  illusion  of  a 
concenTirTcnarTailgement,  its  lightT  falling  witlPal 
exclusive  optical  selection.  These  things  are  a 
parable.  The  scratches  aje  eyents^^andjthe  candle 
is  the  egoisnTrrf^any  person  nowabsent,—  of  Miss 
Vincy,  for  example.  Eosamond  had  a  Providence 
of  her  own  who  had  kindly  made  her  more  charm- 
ing than  other  girls,  and  who  seemed  to  have  ar- 
ranged Fred's  illness  and  Mr.  Wrench's  mistake  in 
order  to  bring  her  and  Lydgate  within  effective 
proximity.  It  would  have  been  to  contravene 
these  arrangements  if  Eosamond  had  consented  to 
go  away  to  Stone  Court  or  elsewhere,  as  her  parents 
wished  her  to  do,  especially  since  Mr.  Lydgate 
thought  the  precaution  needless.  Therefore,  while 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  365 

Miss  Morgan  and  the  children  were  sent  away  to 
a  farmhouse  the  morning  after  Fred's  illness  had 
declared  itself,  Eosamond  refused  to  leave  papa 
and  mamma. 

Poor  mamma  indeed  was  an  object  to  touch  any 
creature  born  of  woman ;  and  Mr.  Vincy,  who 
doted  on  his  wife,  was  more  alarmed  on  her  account 
than  on  Fred's.  But  for  his  insistence  she  would 
have  taken  no  rest :  her  brightness  was  all  be- 
dimmed;  unconscious  of  her  costume,  which  had 
always  been  so  fresh  and  gay,  she  was  like  a  sick 
bird  with  languid  eye  and  plumage  ruffled,  her 
senses  dulled  to  the  sights  and  sounds  that  used 
most  to  interest  her.  Fred's  delirium,  in  which 
he  seemed  to  be  wandering  out  of  her  reach,  tore 
her  heart.  After  her  first  outburst  against  Mr. 
Wrench  she  went  about  very  quietly :  her  one  low 
cry  was  to  Lydgate.  She  would  follow  him  out  of 
the  room  and  put  her  hand  on  his  arm,  moaning 
out,  "  Save  my  boy. "  Once  she  pleaded,  "  He  has 
always  been  good  to  me,  Mr.  Lydgate :  he  never 
had  a  hard  word  for  his  mother, "  —  as  if  poor 
Fred's  suffering  were  an  accusation  against  him. 
All  the  deepest  fibres  of  the  mother's  memory  were 
stirred,  and  the  young  man  whose  voice  took  a 
gentler  tone  when  he  spoke  to  her,  was  one  with 
the  babe  whom  she  had  loved,  with  a  love  new  to 
her,  before  he  was  born. 

"  I  have  good  hope,  Mrs.  Vincy, "  Lydgate  would 
say.  "  Come  down  with  me  and  let  us  talk  about 
the  food. "  In  that  way  he  led  her  to  the  parlour 
where  Eosamond  was,  and  made  a  change  for  her, 
surprising  her  into  taking  some  tea  or  broth  which 
had  been  prepared  for  her.  There  was  a  constant 
understanding  between  him  and  Eosamond  on  these 


366  MIDDLEMARCI1. 

matters.  He  almost  always  saw  her  before  going 
to  the  sick-room,  and  she  appealed  to  him  as  to 
what  she  could  do  for  mamma.  Her  presence  of 
mind  and  adroitness  in  carrying  out  his  hints  were 
admirable,  and  it  is  not  wonderful  that  the  idea  of 
seeing  Rosamond  began  to  mingle  itself  with  his 
interest  in  the  case.  Especially  when  the  critical 
stage  was  passed,  and  he  began  to  feel  confident  of 
Fred's  recovery.  In  the  more  doubtful  time  he 
had  advised  calling  in  Dr.  Sprague  (who,  if  he 
could,  would  rather  have  remained  neutral  on 
Wrench's  account);  but  after  two  consultations, 
the  conduct  of  the  case  was  left  to  Lydgate,  and 
there  was  every  reason  to  make  him  assiduous. 
Morning  and  evening  he  was  at  Mr.  Vincy's,  and 
gradually  the  visits  became  cheerful  as  Fred 
became  simply  feeble,  and  lay  not  only  in  need  of 
the  utmost  petting  but  conscious  of  it,  so  that  Mrs. 
Vincy  felt  as  if,  after  all,  the  illness  had  made  a 
festival  for  her  tenderness. 

Both  father  and  mother  held  it  an  added  reason 
for  good  spirits,  when  old  Mr.  Featherstone  sent 
messages  by  Lydgate,  saying  that  Fred  must  make 
haste  and  get  well,  as  he,  Peter  Featherstone, 
could  not  do  without  him,  and  missed  his  visits 
sadly.  The  old  man  himself  was  getting  bed- 
ridden. Mrs.  Vincy  told  these  messages  to  Fred 
when  he  could  listen,  and  he  turned  towards  her 
his  delicate,  pinched  face,  from  which  all  the 
thick  blond  hair  had  been  cut  away,  and  in  which 
the  eyes  seemed  to  have  got  larger,  yearning  for 
some  word  about  Mary,  —  wondering  what  she  felt 
about  his  illness.  No  word  passed  his  lips;  but 
"  to  hear  with  eyes  belongs  to  love's  rare  wit,"  and 
the  mother  in  the  fulness  of  her  heart  not  only 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  367 

divined   Fred's   longing,   but   felt   ready   for   any 
sacrifice  in  order  to  satisfy  him. 

"  If  I  can  only  see  my  boy  strong  again, "  she 
said,  in  her  loving  folly  ;  "  and  who  knows  ?  —  per- 
haps master  of  Stone  Court !  and  he  can  marry 
anybody  he  likes  then. " 

"  Not  if  they  won't  have  me,  mother, "  said  Fred. 
The  illness  had  made  him  childish,  and  tears  came 
as  he  spoke. 

"  Oh,  take  a  bit  of  jelly,  my  dear, "  said  Mrs. 
Vincy,  secretly  incredulous  of  any  such  refusal. 

She  never  left  Fred's  side  when  her  husband  was 
not  in  the  house,  and  thus  Kosamond  was  in  the 
unusual  position  of  being  much  alone.  Lydgate, 
naturally,  never  thought  of  staying  long  with  her, 
yet  it  seemed  that  the  brief  impersonal  conversa- 
tions they  had  together  were  creating  that  peculiar 
intimacy  which  consists  in  shyness.  They  were 
obliged  to  look  at  each  other  in  speaking,  and  some- 
how the  looking  could  not  be  carried  through  as 
the  matter  of  course  which  it  really  was.  Lydgate 
began  to  feel  this  sort  of  consciousness  unpleasant, 
and  one  day  looked  down,  or  anywhere,  like  an  ill- 
worked  puppet.  But  this  turned  out  badly  :  the 
next  day,  Eosamond  looked  down,  and  the  con- 
sequence was  that  when  their  eyes  met  again,  both 
were  more  conscious  than  before.  There  was  no 
help  for  this  in  science,  and  as  Lydgate  did  not 
want  to  flirt,  there  seemed  to  be  no  help  for  it  in 
folly.  It  was  therefore  a  relief  when  neighbours 
no  longer  considered  the  house  in  quarantine,  and 
when  the  chances  of  seeing  Eosamond  alone  were 
very  much  reduced. 

But  that  intimacy  of  mutual  embarrassment,  in 
which  each  feels  that  the  other  is  feeling  some- 


368  MIDDLEMARCH. 

thing,  having  once  existed,  its  effect  is  not  to  be 
done  away  with.  Talk  about  the  weather  and 
other  well-bred  topics  is  apt  to  seem  a  hollow 
device,  and  behaviour  can  hardly  become  easy  un- 
less it  frankly  recognizes  a  mutual  fascination,  — 
which  of  course  need  not  mean  anything  deep  or 
serious.  This  was  the  way  in  which  Kosamond 
and  Lydgate  slid  gracefully  into  ease,  and  made 
their  intercourse  lively  again.  Visitors  came  and 
went  as  usual,  there  was  once  more  music  in  the 
drawing-room,  and  all  the  extra  hospitality  of  Mr. 
Vincy's  mayoralty  returned.  Lydgate,  whenever 
he  could,  took  his  seat  by  Rosamond's  side,  and 
lingered  to  hear  her  music,  calling  himself  her 
captive,  —  meaning,  all  the  while,  not  to  be  her 
captive.  The  preposterousness  of  the  notion  that 
he  could  at  once  set  up  a  satisfactory  establish- 
ment as  a  married  man  was  a  sufficient  guarantee 
against  danger.  This  play  at  being  a  little  in  love 
was  agreeable,  and  did  not  interfere  with  graver 
pursuits.  Flirtation,  after  all,  was  not  necessarily 
a  singeing  process.  Rosamond,  for  her  part,  had 
never  enjoyed  the  days  so  much  in  her  life  before : 
she  was  sure  of  being  admired  by  some  one  worth 
captivating,  and  she  did  not  distinguish  flirtation 
from  love,  either  in  herself  or  in  another.  She 
seemed  to  be  sailing  with  a  fair  wind  just  whither 
she  would  go,  and  her  thoughts  were  much  occupied 
with  a  handsome  house  in  Lowick  Gate  which  she 
hoped  would  by  and  by  be  vacant.  She  was  quite 
determined,  when  she  was  married,  to  rid  herself 
adroitly  of  all  the  visitors  who  were  not  agreeable 
to  her  at  her  father's ;  and  she  imagined  the  draw- 
ing-room in  her  favourite  house  with  various  styles 
of  furniture. 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  369 

Certainly  her  thoughts  were  much  occupied  with 
Lydgate  himself ;  he  seemed  to  her  almost  perfect : 
if  he  had  known  his  notes  so  that  his  enchantment 
under  her  music  had  been  less  like  an  emotional 
elephant's,  and  if  he  had  been  able  to  discriminate 
better  the  refinements  of  her  taste  in  dress,  she 
could  hardly  have  mentioned  a  deficiency  in  him. 
How  different  he  was  from  young  Plymdale  or  Mr. 
Caius  Larcher!  Those  young  men  had  not  a  notion 
of  French,  and  could  speak  on  no  subject  with 
striking  knowledge,  except  perhaps  the  dyeing  and 
carrying  trades,  which  of  course  they  were  ashamed 
to  mention ;  they  were  Middlemarch  gentry,  elated 
with  their  silver-headed  whips  and  satin  stocks, 
but  embarrassed  in  their  manners,  and  timidly 
jocose :  even  Fred  was  above  them,  having  at  least 
the  accent  and  manner  of  a  university  man. 
Whereas  Lydgate  was  always  listened  to,  bore 
himself  with  the  careless  politeness  of  conscious 
superiority,  and  seemed  to  have  the  right  clothes 
on  by  a  certain  natural  affinity,  without  ever  having 
to  think  about  them.  Eosamond  was  proud  when 
he  entered  the  room,  and  when  he  approached  her 
with  a  distinguishing  smile,  she  had  a  delicious 
sense  that  she  was  the  object  of  enviable  homage. 
If  Lydgate  had  been  aware  of  all  the  pride  he 
excited  in  that  delicate  bosom,  he  might  have  been 
just  as  well  pleased  as  any  other  man,  even  the 
most  densely  ignorant  of  humoral  pathology  or 
fibrous  tissue :  he  held  it  one  of  the  prettiest  atti- 
tudes of  the  feminine  mind  to  adore  a  man's  pre- 
eminence without  too  precise  a  knowledge  of  what 
it  consisted  in. 

But  Eosamond  was  not  one  of  those  helpless 
girls  who  betray  themselves  unawares,  and  whose 
VOL.  i.  — 24 


3?o  MIDDLEMARCH. 

behaviour  is  awkwardly  driven  by  their  impulses, 
instead  of  being  steered  by  wary  grace  and  pro- 
priety. Do  you  imagine  that  her  rapid  forecast 
and  rumination  concerning  house-furniture  and 
society  were  ever  discernible  in  her  conversation, 
even  with  her  mamma?  On  the  contrary,  she 
would  have  expressed  the  prettiest  surprise  and 
disapprobation  if  she  had  heard  that  another  young 
lady  had  been  detected  in  that  immodest  premature- 
ness, —  indeed,  would  probably  have  disbelieved  in 
its  possibility.  For  Rosamond  never  showed  any 
unbecoming  knowledge,  and  was  always  that  com- 
bination of  correct  sentiments,  music,  dancing, 
drawing,  elegant  note-writing,  private  album  for 
extracted  verse,  and  perfect  blond  loveliness,  which 
made  the  irresistible  woman  for  the  doomed  man  of 
that  date.  Think  no  unfair  evil  of  her,  pray :  she 
had  no  wicked  plots,  nothing  sordid  or  mercenary ; 
in  fact,  she  never  thought  of  money  except  as 
something  necessary  which  other  people  would 
always  provide,  She  was  not  in  the  habit  of 
devising  falsehoods,  and  if  her  statements  were  no 
direct  clew  to  fact,  why,  they  were  not  intended 
in  that  light,  —  they  were  among  her  elegant 
accomplishments,  intended  to  please.  Nature  had 
inspired  many  arts  in  finishing  Mrs.  Lemon's 
favourite  pupil,  who  by  general  consent  (Fred's 
excepted)  was  a  rare  compound  of  beauty,  clever- 
ness, and  amiability. 

Lydgate  found  it  more  and  more  agreeable  to  be 
with  her,  and  there  was  no  constraint  now,  there 
was  a  delightful  interchange  of  influence  in  their 
eyes,  and  what  they  said  had  that  superfluity  of 
meaning  for  them,  which  is  observable  with  some 
sense  of  flatness  by  a  third  person ;  still  they  had 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  371 

no  interviews  or  asides  from  which  a  third  person 
need  have  been  excluded.  In  fact,  they  flirted; 
and  Lydgate  was  secure  in  the  belief  that  they  did 
nothing  else.  If  a  man  could  not  love  and  be 
wise,  surely  he  could  flirt  and  be  wise  at  the  same 
time  ?  Really,  the  men  in  Middlemarch,  except 
Mr.  Farebrother,  were  great  bores,  and  Lydgate 
did  not  care  about  commercial  politics  or  cards : 
what  was  he  to  do  for  relaxation  ?  He  was  often 
invited  to  the  Bulstrodes' ;  but  the  girls  there  were 
hardly  out  of  the  schoolroom ;  and  Mrs.  Bulstrode's 
naive  way  of  conciliating  piety  and  worldliness, 
the  nothingness  of  this  life  and  the  desirability  of 
cut  glass,  the  consciousness  at  once  of  filthy  rags 
and  the  best  damask,  was  not  a  sufficient  relief  from 
the  weight  of  her  husband's  invariable  seriousness. 
The  Vincys'  house,  with  all  its  faults,  was  the  pleas- 
anter  by  contrast ;  besides,  it  nourished  Eosamond, 
—  sweet  to  look  at  as  a  half -opened  blush-rose, 
and  adorned  with  accomplishments  for  the  refined 
amusement  of  man. 

But  he  made  some  enemies,  other  than  medical, 
by  his  success  with  Miss  Vincy.  One  evening  he 
came  into  the  drawing-room  rather  late,  when 
several  other  visitors  were  there.  The  card-table 
had  drawn  off  the  elders,  and  Mr.  Ned  Plyrndale 
(one  of  the  good  matches  in  Middlemarch,  though 
not  one  of  its  leading  minds)  was  in  tMe-a-ttte  with 
Rosamond.  He  had  brought  the  last  "  Keepsake, " 
the  gorgeous  watered-silk  publication  which  marked 
modern  progress  at  that  time;  and  he  considered 
himself  very  fortunate  that  he  could  be  the  first  to 
look  over  it  with  her,  dwelling  on  the  ladies  and 
gentlemen  with  shiny  copper-plate  cheeks  and 
copper-plate  smiles,  and  pointing  to  comic  verses 


372  MIDDLEMARCH, 

as  capital  and  sentimental  stories  as  interesting. 
Eosamond  was  gracious,  and  Mr.  Ned  was  satisfied 
that  he  had  the  very  best  thing  in  art  and  litera- 
ture as  a  medium  for  "  paying  addresses, "  —  the 
very  thing  to  please  a  nice  girl.  He  had  also  rea- 
sons, deep  rather  than  ostensible,  for  being  sat- 
isfied with  his  own  appearance.  To  superficial 
observers  his  chin  had  too  vanishing  an  aspect, 
looking  as  if  it  were  being  gradually  reabsorbed. 
And  it  did  indeed  cause  him  some  difficulty  about 
the  fit  of  his  satin  stocks,  for  which  chins  were  at 
that  time  useful. 

"  I  think  the  Honourable  Mrs.  S.  is  something 
like  you, "  said  Mr.  Ned.  He  kept  the  book  open 
at  the  bewitching  portrait,  and  looked  at  it  rather 
languishingly. 

"  Her  back  is  very  large ;  she  seems  to  have  sat 
for  that, "  said  Eosamond,  not  meaning  any  satire, 
but  thinking  how  red  young  Plymdale's  hands 
were,  and  wondering  why  Lydgate  did  not  come. 
She  went  on  with  her  tatting  all  the  while. 

"  I  did  not  say  she  was  as  beautiful  as  you  are, " 
said  Mr.  Ned,  venturing  to  look  from  the  portrait 
to  its  rival. 

"  I  suspect  you  of  being  an  adroit  flatterer, "  said 
Eosamond,  feeling  sure  that  she  should  have  to 
reject  this  young  gentleman  a  second  time. 

But  now  Lydgate  came  in ;  the  book  was  closed 
before  he  reached  Eosamond 's  corner,  and  as  he 
took  his  seat  with  easy  confidence  on  the  other  side 
of  her,  young  Plymdale's  jaw  fell  like  a  barometer 
towards  the  cheerless  side  of  change.  Eosamond 
enjoyed  not  only  Lydgate's  presence  but  its  effect: 
she  liked  to  excite  jealousy. 

"  What  a  late  comer  you  are !  "  she  said,  as  they 


WAITING  FOfi  DEATH.  373 

shook  hands.  "  Mamma  had  given  you  up  a  little 
while  ago.  How  do  you  find  Fred  ?  " 

"  As  usual ;  going  on  well,  but  slowly.  I  want 
him  to  go  away,  —  to  Stone  Court,  for  example. 
But  your  mamma  seems  to  have  some  objection. " 

"  Poor  fellow !  "  said  Eosamond,  prettily.  "  You 
will  see  Fred  so  changed, "  she  added,  turning  to 
the  other  suitor ;  "  we  have  looked  to  Mr.  Lydgate 
as  our  guardian  angel  during  this  illness.  " 

Mr.  Ned  smiled  nervously ;  while  Lydgate,  draw- 
ing the  "  Keepsake"  towards  him  andjopening  it, 
gave  a  short  scornful  laugh  and  tossed  up  his  chin, 
as  if  in  wonderment  at  human  folly. 

"  What  are  you  laughing  at  so  profanely  ?  "  said 
Eosamond,  with  bland  neutrality. 

"  I  wonder  which  would  turn  out  to  be  the 
silliest,  —  the  engravings  or  the  writing  here, " 
said  Lydgate,  in  his  most  convinced  tone,  while 
he  turned  over  the  pages  quickly,  seeming  to  see 
all  through  the  book  in  no  time,  and  showing  his 
large  white  hands  to  much  advantage,  as  Eosamond 
thought.  "  Do  look  at  this  bridegroom  coming  out 
of  church  :  did  you  ever  see  such  a  'sugared  inven- 
tion, '  —  as  the  Elizabethans  used  to-  say  ?  Did  any 
haberdasher  ever  look  so  smirking  ?  Yet  I  will 
answer  for  it  the  story  makes  him  one  of  the  first 
gentlemen  in  the  land.  " 

"  You  are  so  severe,  I  am  frightened  at  you, " 
said  Eosamond,  keeping  her  amusement  duly 
moderate.  Poor  young  Plymdale  had  lingered 
with  admiration  over  this  very  engraving,  and  his 
spirit  was  stirred. 

"  There  are  a  great  many  celebrated  people  writ- 
ing in  the  'Keepsake,'  at  all  events,"  he  said,  in  a 
tone  at  once  piqued  and  timid.  K  This  is  the  first 
time  I  have  heard  it  called  silly.  " 


374  MIDDLEMAHCH. 

"  I  think  I  shall  turn  round  on  you  and  accuse 
you  of  being  a  Goth, "  said  Eosamond,  looking  at 
Lydgate  with  a  smile.  "  I  suspect  you  know 
nothing  about  Lady  Blessington  and  L.  E.  L. " 
Eosamond  herself  was  not  without  relish  for  these 
writers,  but  she  did  not  readily  commit  herself 
by  admiration,  and  was  alive  to  the  slightest  hint 
that  anything  was  not,  according  to  Lydgate,  in 
the  very  highest  taste. 

"  But  Sir  Walter  Scott,  —  I  suppose  Mr.  Lydgate 
knows  him, "  said  young  Plymdale,  a  little  cheered 
by  this  advantage. 

"Oh,  I  read  no  literature  now,"  said  Lydgate, 
shutting  the  book,  and  pushing  it  away.  "  I  read 
so  much  when  I  was  a  lad  that  I  suppose  it  will 
last  me  all  my  life.  I  used  to  know  Scott's  poems 
by  heart. " 

"  I  should  like  to  know  when  you  left  off, "  said 
Eosamond,  "  because  then  I  might  be  sure  that  I 
knew  something  which  you  did  not  know. " 

"  Mr.  Lydgate  would  say  that  was  not  worth 
knowing,"  said  Mr.  Ned,  purposely  caustic. 

"  On  the  contrary, "  said  Lydgate,  showing  no 
smart,  but  smiling  with  exasperating  confidence  at 
Eosamond.  "  It  would  be  worth  knowing  by  the 
fact  that  Miss  Vincy  could  tell  it  me. " 

Young  Plymdale  soon  went  to  look  at  the  whist- 
playing,  thinking  that  Lydgate  was  one  of  the 
most  conceited,  unpleasant  fellows  it  had  ever  been 
his  ill-fortune  to  meet. 

"  How  rash  you  are !  "  said  Eosamond,  inwardly 
delighted.  "  Do  you  see  that  you  have  given 
offence  ? " 

"What!   is   it  Mr.    Plymdale's   book?     I   am 
sorry.     I  didn't  think  about  it." 


WAITING  FOR  DEATH.  375 

"  I  shall  begin  to  admit  what  you  said  of  your- 
self when  you  first  came  here,  —  that  you  are  a 
bear,  and  want  teaching  by  the  birds.  " 

"  Well,  there  is  a  bird  who  can  teach  me  what 
she  will.  Don't  I  listen  to  her  willingly  ?  " 

To  Rosamond  it  seemed  as  if  she  and  Lydgate 
were  as  good  as  engaged.  That  they  were  some 
time  to  be  engaged  had  long  been  an  idea  in  her 
mind;  and  ideas,  we  know,  tend  to  a  more  solid 
kind  of  existence,  the  necessary  materials  being  at 
hand.  It  is  true,  Lydgate  had  the  counter-idea  of 
remaining  unengaged ;  but  this  was  a  mere  nega- 
tive, a  shadow  cast  by  other  resolves  which  them- 
selves were  capable  of  shrinking.  Circumstance 
was  almost  sure  to  be  on  the  side  of  Rosamond's 
idea,  which  had  a  shaping  activity  and  looked 
through  watchful  blue  eyes,  whereas  Lydgate 's  lay 
blind  and  unconcerned  as  a  jelly-fish  which  gets 
melted  without  knowing  it. 

That  evening  when  he  went  home,  he  looked  at 
his  phials  to  see  how  a  process  of  maceration  was 
going  on,  with  undisturbed  interest;  and  he  wrote 
out  his  daily  notes  with  as  much  precision  as 
usual.  The  reveries  from  which  it  was  difficult 
for  him  to  detach  himself  were  ideal  constructions 
of  something  else  than  Rosamond's  virtues,  and 
the  primitive  tissue  was  still  his  fair  unknown. 
Moreover,  he  was  beginning  to  feel  some  zest  for 
the  growing  though  half-suppressed  feud  between 
him  and  the  other  medical  men,  which  was  likely 
to  become  more  manifest,  now  that  Bulstrode's 
method  of  managing  the  new  hospital  was  about  to 
be  declared ;  and  there  were  various  inspiriting 
signs  that  his  non-acceptance  by  some  of  Peacock's 
patients  might  be  counterbalanced  by  the  impres- 


376  MIDDLEMARCH. 

sion  he  had  produced  in  other  quarters.  Only  a 
few  days  later,  when  he  had  happened  to  overtake 
Rosamond  on  the  Lowick  road  and  had  got  down 
from  his  horse  to  walk  by  her  side  until  he  had 
quite  protected  her  from  a  passing  drove,  he  had 
been  stopped  by  a  servant  on  horseback  with  a 
message  calling  him  in  to  a  house  of  some  impor- 
tance where  Peacock  had  never  attended;  and  it 
was  the  second  instance  of  this  kind.  The  servant 
was  Sir  James  Chettam's,  and  the  house  was 
Lowick  Manor. 


END  OP  VOL.   I. 


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